


Family Never Ends

by orphan_account



Category: Homestuck
Genre: Bro Is An Asshole, Crossdressing, Drug and Alcohol [Ab]use, Dubious Consent, F/M, Incest, Light BDSM, M/M, Multi, Rimming, Shitty Relationships, Sibling Incest, Slurs, Stridercest - Freeform
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2012-07-17
Updated: 2014-08-08
Packaged: 2017-11-10 03:07:59
Rating: Explicit
Warnings: Graphic Depictions Of Violence, Major Character Death, Rape/Non-Con
Chapters: 29
Words: 227,783
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/461568
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/orphan_account/pseuds/orphan_account
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Dave Lalonde is an internationally renown movie director arguably more famous than God, and indisputably richer. He certainly isn't expecting the bizarrely dressed stranger he runs into in the bathroom of an Academy Awards afterparty to indelibly interpose himself into his life in the worst possible ways. However much he might want to, Dirk Strider inevitably proves to be a man that Dave will never be able to forget.</p>
            </blockquote>





	1. Chapter 1

turntechGodhead [TG] began pestering tentacleTherapist [TT]

TG: yo   
TT: Dave, it's nearly one in the morning here.  
TT: I was just about to go to bed.   
TG: who the fuck goes to bed before 5 am   
TT: I do?   
TG: too bad  
TG: anyway im at the vanity fair party   
TT: Oh, right.  
TT: Tonight was the Oscars.   
TG: what you didnt even watch   
TT: No.  
TT: Why even bother when I know you'll just call me up at 12:53 AM to bitch about it anyway?   
TG: really feeling the love here sis  
TG: kings speech won best picture  
TG: and best screenplay  
TG: and best director   
TT: Ouch.   
TG: yeah  
TG: 8 nominations and fucking nothing   
TT: An Academy Award nomination isn't nothing, Dave.   
TG: rose as my sister you have a duty to listen to my entitled whining without complaint   
TT: I never asked for this.   
TG: life sucks deal with it   
TT: Sigh.  
TT: Ok, dearest brother, go ahead.  
TT: Tell me all about your night.  
TT: Spare not even the slightest detail.   
TG: im in hell  
TG: and by hell i mean  
TG: mom is doing body shots off madonna   
TT: ... At the Vanity Fair party?   
TG: yes  
TG: its fucking chaos  
TG: im too sober for this   
TT: Wow.  
TT: I guess it's really changed since I last attended.   
TG: maybe if you left your hermit cave once in a while youd know what all the cool kids were up to   
TT: I leave my hermit cave all of the time.  
TT: I just typically have better things to do than spend my evenings babysitting my mother.   
TG: man if i dont take her to these retarded hollywood events at least a couple of times a year she wont get off my ass  
TG: its suffer now or suffer later   
TT: Oh, I am well aware.  
TT: Whenever you're not paying her enough attention, the phonecalls begin.  
TT: "Oh, Rosie, when are you going to move to Los Angeles."  
TT: "Rosie, I'm so lonely, come move to Los Angeles."  
TT: "Dave never calls me anymore, Rosie, I'm dying, you need to move to Los Angeles, are you going to let your mother perish all by her lonesome."  
TT: Usually at that point I hear her vomiting into the toilet over the phone.   
TG: im surprised she can even enunciate the name los angeles   
TT: I'm paraphrasing, clearly.   
TG: haha oh man   
TT: It's all much less entertaining when all of these interactions occur between midnight and four in the morning.   
TT: Kind of like you're doing right now, actually. Isn't that just the funniest thing?  
TT: Like mother, like son.   
TG: youre just jealous im her favorite   
TT: Excuse me, I believe I'll need a moment to pry myself off the floor once I've finished laughing so hard I can't breathe.  
TT: No, Dave, you can keep on being the golden child.  
TT: Your burden is one I never wish to bear.   
TG: yeah that one was a stretch  
TG: im one great big fucking martyr and dont you fucks ever forget it   
TT: We stand in reverent awe of your brave sacrifice. You're a hero to us both.   
TG: all right off one cross and onto another madonnas daughter is crying  
TG: i have to put a stop this   
TT: Godspeed, Dave.   
TG: god is one hell of an asshole

turntechGodhead [TG] ceased pestering tentacleTherapist [TT]

 

Your name is Dave Lalonde, and hell is prying your fifty year old mother's face out of Madonna's tits.

" _Mom,_ " you grit out, your face the utmost picture of exasperation as she drunkenly clings to your shoulders and slobbers all over your perfectly good tuxedo. "I think it's time to go home."

You spare Madonna's daughter a sympathetic glance over you shoulder as you steer your mother away from the throng of onlooking party-goers (when you notice her uneven limping gait you look down to discover one of her shoes is conspicuously absent; you begin mentally preparing for the 3 hour phonecall you'll get the next morning where she cries because _those were my favorite Luis Vuitton pumps_ , and you'll remind her that she has at least eighty-two pairs of Luis Vuitton pumps and each and every one of them is her favorite pair of Luis Vuitton pumps, and you'll offer to buy her eighty-two more if it'll get her to shut up, but _oh, Dave, but it won't be the same, these were **special,**_ and then you'll check out the prices on handguns). 

"David —" (Your full name isn't even David.) "I have to... I've got to use th-the laaaaahvatory," she slurs out. Her legs promptly give way and you have to scramble to catch her and support her weight.

You're close to the exit and less than enthusiastic about the prospect of having to double back and drag her dead weight all the way to the bathrooms. "Can't it wait until I take you home?" you grit out, adjusting the arm around your shoulders when it threatens to slip off.

"No, I've gotta go noowwww," she whines; you groan histrionically and turn around.

You dump her off at the women's bathroom and stand about anxiously outside as you wait for her to take her requisite eternity to piss or vomit or whatever the fuck she's doing in there. You want to go in and make sure she doesn't drown in the toilet, but you're not in the mood for the tabloid coverage you'll receive when you scare the shit out of a couple of the scandal-starved socialites that drunkenly loiter around the women's bathroom for fucking hours at a time.

You suddenly realize you also have to pee.

"Mom, I'm going to take a piss, stay here and don't wander off," you half-shout into the bathroom; upon hearing her unintelligible reply of 'ohhiiyehahkay', you hurry to do your business. You'd be more confident about leaving a 2 year old child to its own devices but you really have to go.

You bluster into the men's bathroom, and upon discovering some asshole decided to occupy the middle of the three urinals, you opt for a stall instead. Your bladder readily proves itself to be frustratingly capacitous; by the time you're done, you anxiously anticipate having to scour the party for your mother when you inevitably discover her to have wandered off to god knows where.

But even in your rush, what you see when you open the toilet stall stops you dead in your tracks: the asshole bogarting the urinals is still there, and he is the single most ridiculous looking man you have ever seen in your entire life.

He zips up and turns around right as you step back out from the stall and you are unable to believe your eyes. Here, in the bathroom of the Vanity Fairy Oscar Party, is a man with a _popped collar_. As if that alone weren't enough, he tops it off with fingerless gloves, a baseball cap, and an obnoxious pair of pointed shades that lead you to question how he even managed to leave his house.

But he wasn't in ignorance of the dress code, oh no. His idea of formal attire seems to have been incompetently tying a bowtie around his polo collar, and... are those fucking _spats?_

There's almost an artistic efficacy in which he hits every single cornerstone of douchebaggery — the gloves, the absurdly spiked hair, the pointy anime shades, the popped collar, and the _spats,_ oh god he's wearing fucking _spats_ with jeans and a polo, this is _incredible_ — and you'd offer to shake his hand if that conspicuously front-facing cap didn't cast your appraisal of his sincerity into doubt; wouldn't turning it backwards have been that much more obnoxious? Why did he pass up that opportunity?

Which, you figure, may well be the crucial component of his calculations, the keystone capping this carefully composed facade — just one little detail that makes you think, _oh my god, what if he actually takes himself seriously?_

And then he opens his mouth.

"Hey. You're Dave Lalonde, aren't you?"

You should have figured it from the indoor shades — guy's a groupie aping your shtick. Judging by his direly inappropriate wardrobe, he clearly wasn't invited through any proper channel; you wonder how much money he paid for the chance to run into you in the bathroom. Kind of pathetic, given the fact he looks to be at least forty years old.

"Yeah," you reply succinctly. The guy just stands there and watches as you walk to the sinks, thrust your hands under a faucet and hastily wash them off. The way he looks at you makes you uncomfortable. "Dude, do you want something?" you eventually ask, hoping that the answer won't be a shank in your eyeball.

"You look at scripts?"

Oh _great._

You snort out a laugh and raise an eyebrow derisively as you pull down a sheet of paper towel to dry your hands. "No."

The dude doesn't seem to be phased by your attempted brush-off; his face remains set in a stoically blank expression all the while. He apparently takes fidelity to copying your public persona exceptionally seriously. "If it doesn't grab you in the first three pages you can burn it." 

"Look, I'm in a fucking hurry here so if you wouldn't mind —" You pause to pat down your pockets in search of wherever the fuck you left the damn things, growing visibly agitated. When you finally find a card you shove it rudely into his face, brandishing it impatiently until he takes it from your hand. "— talk to my manager about it, it's his job to handle this crap, I don't have the time or the energy to deal with every single —"

"Daaaaave, wheerre aaaaaaaare yooouu," you hear your mother wail from beyond the bathroom door, the irregular clack-stomp-clack of her distinctly motile sounding feet resounding through the outside hallway. You curse under your breath and hurry out to collect her, sparing not a second glance back at the man in your wake.

 

***

 

You regret buying your mother a house with such a huge fucking garden.

She's leaning practically all her weight onto you as the two of you make your way up the long path leading to your mother's extravagant estate. You're almost as tired as she is drunk, and every step you take feels like a mile traveled. "The fuck didn't I get something with a driveway up to the door," you mutter to yourself.

"Ehhh?"

"Nothing, talking to myself."

"Daaavey, you craaz—" 

Your mother suddenly stops short and begins to gag; startled, you skittishly reposition yourself to avoid any potential wayward chunks, still careful to not allow her to fall. Luckily, all she produces is a bunch of loud noises.

"Imakay, whew, f-false alarm," she wheezes, before immediately dry heaving again.

"C'mon, let's just get you inside," you urge. Leading her up the steps to the front door is an ordeal, and you remain in anxious anticipation of sudden projectile vomit all the way.

When you finally reach the top of the mountain (or, the series of four steps, as it were), your mother slowly takes a moment to look back and forth between her hands — one around your shoulder, the other occupied by her sole surviving shoe — before she finally figures out what she's missing. "Crap, I left my purse in the car," she groans. "Do you have a — a house key? ... Wait, did I give you a new one after we changed the locks? How long ago was that? Oh, maybe it was years ago. Or did we change it again recently? I th-think I, no, there was definitely a raccoon, I remember the raccoon, I think we might have changed it because of the raccoon hands and huh wait... hmm uhm raccoon keys..."

She trails off into a string of unintelligible mumbling that you don't even bother making an attempt to parse.

After fishing them from your pocket, you fumble with your keys; you can't remember what half these fucking things are for. You try a few with no luck. Between the unnerving weight of her stare and the even heavier weight of her body leaned fully against you, you eventually decide you don't have the patience. "Fuck it. All right, wait here, I'll go back and get —"

"Dave, don't be ridiculous, just ring the, the doooooorbell," she chides, flapping her shoe-hand spastically in your general direction. You think she was trying to smack you.

When you just glare at her uncomfortably, she gives a great dramatic sigh and pushes off from you to stagger up to the front door on her own.

"Mom, wait —"

She ignores you and repeatedly jabs her finger into the ringer. "Hooonneeyyy, come let me in, I locked myself out of the house aaggaaaaainnn," she shouts, wobbling unsteadily on her feet. You spend a few moments pouting petulantly before you groan with exasperation and move back to support her so she doesn't fall down the steps and break her neck. 

Your dread steadily swells as the sound of approaching footsteps from within the house grow louder. You steel yourself with your most impassive expression as you hear the locks of the door click; when the door swings open to reveal the man inside, you're ready with your best thousand-yard stare.

He seems surprised to see you; usually you just let yourself in and leave before you have the misfortune of an encounter. "Good evening, Dave," your stepfather says after he rather hastily removes the pipe from his mouth, as if you didn't already fucking see it (you hate how he smokes in the house; you used to pick fights with him about it all the time, until your mother got him to agree to not do it in front of you and you to agree to pretend he doesn't do it at all. As if you can't smell the fucking shit all over the house every time you come over).

"Egbert," you tersely acknowledge; your stepfather bristles reflexively in turn. He appears as tense and uneasy as you are, like he's bracing himself for a confrontation — luckily for him you're fucking exhausted, so you settle for judging silence and and the slightest hint of a sneer instead. 

Your mother is the one to break the uncomfortable silence that stretches between you. " _Dears,_ " she says, her voice laced with an artificial sweetness that readily betrays a well-practiced exasperation. " _One of you_ is gonna have to help me inside because I am puuhhhhhh- _lastered._ "

"Yes, I can see that," Egbert says evenly. His tone immediately becomes tense and guarded again as soon as his attention returns to you. "Here, let me take her." After setting his pipe aside on the small table next to the door as quickly and inconspicuously as he can manage, he opens his arms to receive her.

You carefully extricate yourself from your mother and pass her over to your stepfather, who grunts when she essentially topples onto him. He helps her regain her footing and looks back to you. "Would you like to come in, Dave?"

He knows full well what your answer will be, but he can never help but make a show of being _polite_ and _gracious_ and _the better man._ "No, it's late. I'm heading back home."

"Take care, then, Dave. Goodnight," he says, with a congenial smile and an amiable tip of his hat. When he turns his back to lead your mother into the house, you contemplate how it would feel to punch his stupid bald head.

"Oh, Davey baby, don't forget to bring up my purse," your mother calls back over her shoulder before she returns her attention to her new escort. "Raccoons have _hands,_ honey. Did you _know_ that?"

"Yes, dear."


	2. Chapter 2

You wake up when the light of the midday sun filters in through the western glass wall of your apartment bedroom. You _get_ up two hours later when your phone rings and forces you to haul your lazy ass out of bed.

Groggy and disoriented, you stagger over to the dresser you dumped your keys, wallet and cell on, and upon seeing your manager's number on the screen, elect to allow it to ring as long as possible before you pick up.

"Dave, fuckin' _deal_ with this fucker," your manager brusquely announces from the phone, skipping a greeting or any explanation of what the fuck he's talking about.

You sigh and flop back down onto your bed, phone to ear. "There are a lot of fuckers in the world, Ampora, you're gonna have to be more specific than that."

"Well _apparently_ you gave some god damn asshole my number and he's callin' me non-fuckin'-stop, won't take a hint and I'm this close to tellin' him to _blow his worthless fuckin' brains out_ but I'm a _professional,_ Dave, I've got to _modulate my anger_ , I can't go sayin' shit like that, I swear, the _shit_ I have to deal with for your sad sorry skinny ass —"

You sit up, press a thumb and forefinger to your temples and sigh. "Slow down. Speak in coherent sentences. The hell are you going on about?" you ask as you get up again and shuffle out of the bedroom in your underwear.

"Guy says his name is Dirk. Says he met you at some party or another a while back and tried to push his script, and you sent him to me. Ringin' any bells?"

"Ugh, yeah, that guy," you groan. You make your way through the spacious living area to the liquor cabinet, which you keep right beside your office for obvious reasons. Nothing like whiskey first thing in the... 2 PM."I was with my mom and I just needed to get him off my back. He seemed fucking nuts."

"Nuts?? Listen Lalonde, nuts does not even _begin_ — I give him the brushoff, you know, all polite and shit because I'm a stand-up fuckin' guy, best manager anybody could ever damn get, but he does not god damn _get_ it and keeps callin' and callin' and callin', and even when I gave it to him straight as can fuckin' be, the dumb-ass ass-muncher would! _Not! Let! Up!_ I've been puttin' up with _two fuckin' weeks_ of this Lalonde, I have had _enough._ " 

"Call the phone company and get a block on his number if he won't fuck off," you reply in your best 'does it sound like I give a shit' voice. You pour yourself a straight glass of whiskey and let yourself into your office.

"I FUCKIN' DID!" he suddenly shouts; you somehow miraculously manage to avoid dropping your phone or your booze when you jump.

"Jesus, okay — fine, just send me his fucking script," you accede with a sigh as you sit down in the chair in front of your cluttered desk and slowly swivel yourself in circles. Just because you're in here doesn't mean you're ready to actually _do_ anything. "I'll write up a formal evisceration for you to send him and maybe he'll off himself."

"Dave, _I like how you think._ "

"I know you do, Eridan."

Eridan blathers for a time about inane bullshit you could not be bothered to listen to let alone recount, until you find a place to gracefully end the conversation and hang up. You power on your computer and open a new script file, which gives you something to stare listlessly at for several minutes.

You're in something of a lull period; the screenplay for The Moive is just about set in stone, but principal photography is a good month off, so there's not much left for you to do. You figure you may as well get started on the script for the next installment and save yourself a few sleepless nights down the road. You have plans. Big plans.

But the siren call of the internet proves irresistible. Instead of doing any actual work, you spend quite a bit of time scouring gossip websites for mentions of yourself; no matter how inane and infuriating it gets, you can never seem to stop yourself from looking.

You have a good laugh at a blind item implying you, Ben Stiller and Owen Wilson used to live together in a polyamorous triad. You laugh even harder at an article speculating about your sister's possible addiction to psychedelic drugs and make a note to send it to her later. You stop laughing when you read a gossip column claiming Jade was having an affair with Bear Grylls while you were dating. By the time you get around to seeing Perez Hilton insult your record cufflinks, you're kind of mad.

Fuck you, Perez.

After about an hour of diligently accomplishing nothing besides becoming pleasantly buzzed, you're alerted to a new email; you open your inbox and strategically avoid the deluge of correspondences you lack the energy to even read and check the email from Eridan. 

... You open Pesterchum.

turntechGodhead [TG] began pestering caligulasAquarium [CA]

TG: hes going to  
TG: reasj   
CA: what   
TG: im reading your email and trying to figre out what the fuck it says   
CA: jesus lalonde are you stupid it says roast   
TG: ok  
TG: maybe that would be easier to see  
TG: if you used a font in your emails  
TG: that was actually readable   
CA: what no my font is awesome  
CA: the Ses are like little wwaves its fuckin sweet   
TG: i dont even know what to say to that   
CA: you say nothin  
CA: cause theres nothin you can say back at a FACT   
TG: ok  
TG: you are literally retarded   
CA: what the fuck did you just fuckin say about me you little bitch   
TG: lets talk about this script   
CA: oh man did you read it  
CA: how shitty is it  
CA: you gotta tell me how youre gonna rip him a new one im fuckin stoked   
TG: eridan you sent it to me 3 fucking minutes ago   
CA: yeah   
TG: ...  
TG: so what did he say exactly about this adatpation shit   
CA: pretty much just what i told you  
CA: he wants to adapt a book  
CA: called detective fuckin pony  
CA: its part of a scholastic series made for little girls in the 90s  
CA: an maybe im goin out on a limb here but i think i can safely guess that they blow dick   
TG: thats seriously it  
TG: he circumvented a call block to get me to read his adaptation of a pony book   
CA: well thats what it sure looks like  
CA: he called me on a sunday dave  
CA: a fuckin SUNDAY can you believe the NERVE of that guy   
TG: well ok  
TG: im going to read it i guess  
TG: ill give you my formal dis letter later   
CA: great  
CA: later man

turntechGodhead [TG] ceased pestering caligulasAquarium [CA]

 

You close out of Pesterchum. You haven't actually eaten anything since you got up, and you're not particularly eager to slog through this bullshit to begin with, so you figure you may as well make an incredibly late breakfast before you start.

When you stand up, you're also startled to discover that you're much drunker than you'd intended to get. Shit, how much did you even drink?

Now thoroughly disheartened by your overshot inebriation, you wander out into the kitchen — and promptly recoil when the light sears your sensitive eyes. You're wobbly and tired so you change your course to flop down onto the couch in the living area. Drawing the shades on the entire west wall seems like it would be _work;_ pressing your face directly into the black leather cushions spares you from the bright light with minimal exertion. 

As soon as you settle into a slothful repose, you remember you're still really hungry.

With a groan, you sit up, walk back to your office (with your eyes closed — you knock something over and don't bother to check what it is), get your phone, walk back, and then lie down again with your back to the glass wall. In your awkward position, you awkwardly thumb through your contact list until you find who you're looking for and send a text.

About a minute later you hear the back door that leads to the floor's shared service lift unlock, open and then shut again; your assistant lives in the penthouse on the other half of the floor you live on, set up with the finest luxuries money can buy in exchange for being on hand to do everything you're too lazy to. 

You hear her stop in the middle of the room. "Dave," she calls out. 

"M'on the couch," you mumble, face still pressed into the cushions.

"What would you like me to make you," she doesn't ask so much as state. Her voice has a monotone quality to it that goes above and beyond the deadpan you affect for your public image; where you act, she just _is._ Everything about her makes you curious, but her stoic introversion makes you reticent to pry.

"Whatever. Think there's turkey in the fridge. Sandwich? Two sandwiches."

She doesn't deign to give a verbal reply, simply heads into the kitchen and sets to work. 

"Will you get my shades, too? The light's killing me, I left them in my bedroom."

"Ok."

After a few minutes of moving around the kitchen, you hear her walk to your bedroom, walk back, open and close the cupboards, and then make her way over to you. When you roll over and open your eyes, Aradia is stood before you with a plate of sandwiches in one hand and your sunglasses in the other, her body shadowing you from the light. You realize you're still in your underwear, but she's seen you naked and covered in your own vomit enough times that you don't have especially much shame left where she's concerned.

You sit up groggily and take the proffered items, setting the shades onto your face and the plate onto your lap. When she makes no move to leave, you look up at her with a raised brow. "You wanna hang out?"

"Would you like me to hang out," she replies. It's like having your own creepily subservient Japanese robot wife. With less sex.

You shrug noncommittally as you flip on the TV. You make sure you mouth is full when you reply. "Whatever you wanna do."

She sits down on the half of the L-shaped couch you aren't presently hogging, back straight with her hands folded primly in her lap. She stares at the TV as you flip through the channels, her gaze focused yet glassy.

You didn't know what to make of Aradia in the beginning. Herself the daughter of an assistant to a children's show host with a reputation for being a spectacular prima donna, she came highly recommended — and while her performance was and always has been top notch, her intractably dispassionate personality did not gel especially well with your borderline pathological need to impress. Though you'd be loath to admit it to anyone, least of all her, those first few weeks were a blow to your pride; the way she'd just sit there silent and stony in the face of your sickest fires left you more than a little self-conscious.

Rather than admit defeat and hire a new assistant, you ended up going to some retrospectively embarrassing lengths to try to reaffirm your self-image as a comedic god; at one point you found yourself up at 3 AM actually fucking scripting out scenarios you were _sure_ would get her good — but you've still never seen her laugh even once. You doubt she even likes your movies.

You eventually came to the realization that Aradia was the one person in the world utterly immune to your charm and you would just have to deal with it.

As the years went on, you built something of a mutual understanding; though you may not get why she is, you understand pretty well _what_ she is, and there's a rapport in that. She still doesn't laugh at your jokes, but you figured out other ways to play off her when you got to know her; she's not a stranger to sass, deadpan she may be. She's become something of a straight man to you in your own private Jeeves and Wooster show.

And you trust her. There aren't a whole lot of people in your life you can say that about; in a world where others stand to gain so much by screwing you, you often hesitate to attribute more than superficial sincerity to those gracious to you. But Aradia? You'd honestly expect your own _mother_ to sell you out before Aradia would betray your confidence.

With the channel set on some nauseating reality show you pay only the scarcest of attention to, you ramble on at her about your week. She doesn't say much in reply, but you're used to that; she answers when you ask her questions and not much else.

The next thing you realize is that it's dark and you're alone. 

Groggy, you sit up. Your shoulder is sore from where you must've fallen asleep on it. You pull off your shades so you can actually see the time on the cable box in the dim light; it's nearing 8:45. Well, there's a whole day pissed away.

At least you've mostly sobered up. You've got a bit of a headache so you get up to take a couple of aspirin with a glass of water, which you hastily down. 

You feel pretty gross at this point so you stumble back through your bedroom into the bathroom for a long overdue shower. You do your hair and actually get around to getting dressed, which doesn't particularly service much more than your own vanity this late at night.

Resolving to make up for lost time, you head back into your office and pull up your stalker's script; you really don't give enough of a shit to actually read the original book. You're immediately aggravated to discover that it is distressingly long.

Just from the page count, you ballpark the runtime of the film at at least two and a half hours, if not three. You open up the original book to compare; there are more than twice as many pages in his script than there are in the actual book. What the fuck? That thing should scarcely fill a 90 minute feature.

You're now at least a bit intrigued to discover how the fuck he managed that. At a glance, it looks like he's at least adhered to a proper formatting standard (obsessively so; it's composed _exactly_ as you write yours, which you aren't especially surprised about), so the only place the length could be coming from is the _actual content_.

With a mix of curiosity and trepidation, you begin.

***

turntechGodhead [TG] began pestering tentacleTherapist [TT]

TG: hey  
TT: Well, I suppose messaging me the literal moment I wake up is a step up from the 3 AM pesterings.  
TT: It's a good thing I don't have any work to get done or anything.  
TG: huh what was that  
TG: im sorry did you say something  
TG: nah must just be my imagination  
TT: Dave.  
TG: ok get this  
TT: Sigh.  
TG: you know the guy i told you about running into at vanity fair  
TT: Which one?  
TG: the spats guy  
TT: Ohhhhhh.  
TT: Yes, I remember the spats guy.  
TG: ok so  
TG: i dumped him on eridan right  
TG: normally hes phenomenal at making people not want to have any sort of association with me  
TT: I still don't understand how you haven't fired him.  
TT: I don't understand how he hasn't been killed, honestly.  
TG: hes fucking hilarious in that really pathetic way that isnt actually funny at all but makes everyone around him feel better about themselves  
TG: he provides a valuable service  
TG: anyway he couldnt get the guy to fuck off so i just told him to send me the script  
TG: ok are you at all familiar with the pony pals series  
TT: ... That's an interesting segue.  
TT: I can't say that I am, no.  
TG: well theyre shit books for little girls about ponies  
TG: and the script he sent me is an adaptation of one of them  
TG: called  
TG: i cannot even make this shit up  
TG: "detective pony"  
TT: Wow.  
TT: I would expect something terrible from someone who wears a popped collar, but that is... something else.  
TG: no heres the thing  
TG: its seriously fucking good  
TG: im not even kidding  
TT: I'm having trouble imagining something entitled "Detective Pony" being anything but embarrassingly awful.  
TG: oh the book is terrible  
TG: but this shit is like  
TG: a cyclical deconstruction of the entire pony book genre  
TG: which is an actual thing and not a thing i just made up btw  
TT: I'm all too aware.  
TG: like it held my interest even on its own but when i went back to read the actual book i was surprised by how much depth it works out of the existing material even when on face value its changed so much  
TG: it starts off pretty close to the original book with some nonsensical scatological divergences that misleadingly set up crude thematic expectations  
TG: but like halfway through it totally derails into some nightmarish psychological thriller and hellscape of pony death  
TG: even then its really closely patterned on the original events in a deceptively subversive way  
TG: this is childhood destroying shit  
TG: here let me send you this shit read the original book first its short  
turntechGodhead [TG] sent tentacleTherapist [TT] file "detectivepony.pdf"   
turntechGodhead [TG] sent tentacleTherapist [TT] file "detective pony screenplay 2011.pdf"  
TT: Oh boy.  
TT: I'll read it when I'm finished up with my work for the day.   
TG: ok tell me what you think later  
TG: im gonna go pass out i was up all night   
TT: Sweet dreams, brother mine.   
TG: choke on a dick lil sis 

turntechGodhead [TG] ceased pestering tentacleTherapist [TT]

TT: Wow, that was rude.  
TT: You're barely a day older than me. I think our maturity differential more than makes up for such a meager temporal displacement.  
TT: I am clearly the big sister in this family.

turntechGodhead [TG] began pestering tentacleTherapist [TT]

TG: shut up

turntechGodhead [TG] ceased pestering tentacleTherapist [TT]

TT: Why don't you shut up?

turntechGodhead [TG] began pestering tentacleTherapist [TT]

TG: rose youre not going to have the last word let it go  
TG: bitch

turntechGodhead [TG] ceased pestering tentacleTherapist [TT]

TT: Your harsh yet unavoidably veracious barbs strike me deep at my very core.  
TT: How will I ever recover from such brutal savaging?  
TT: These words will haunt my dreams for months to come.

turntechGodhead [TG] began pestering tentacleTherapist [TT]

TG: write a book about it stephanie meyer

turntechGodhead [TG] ceased pestering tentacleTherapist [TT]

TT: Wow, that one was low.

turntechGodhead [TG] began pestering tentacleTherapist [TT]

TG: ok fuck this i really need to sleep

turntechGodhead [TG] ceased pestering tentacleTherapist [TT]

TT: Goodnight, Dave.

tentacleTherapist [TT] ceased pestering turntechGodhead [TG]

 

***

Waking up is fucking bullshit.

You set your alarm clock to 10:00 AM and feel like a zombie when you finally manage to pull yourself out of bed after the 4th assault on your snooze button. You never have any clue how you manage to start getting up at 6 for shoots.

You will yourself to perform basic hygienic rituals and eat breakfast with Aradia. After your millionth cup of coffee, you're awake enough enough to function — but not quite enough to deal with Eridan. _That_ requires a healthy half hour of procrastination before you finally acknowledge that it must be done.

You take your cell into your office, settle into your chair and sigh deeply as you wait for him to pick up the phone. "Hey Ampora," you greet him.

"Hey. It's me. Eri."

"... I know."

He grumbles unintelligibly over the line. "Yeah whatever, the fuck you want?"

You lean back in your chair and close your eyes. This is going to be fun. "I want you to set me up a meeting with the asshole."

"Huh? Listen Dave, as much as I'd love to blast a craterous hole in his shitty fuckin' chest myself, I've found myself fantasizin' about it often in fact, you can't go doin' anything _illegal_ —"

"What?" you interrupt him. "I don't want to _kill_ him, I'm going to take his script." 

There's a long pause where you can practically hear him drawing himself up over the phone. "Sorry I didn't catch that, I thought I heard you say 'I'm going to take his script' but that couldn't a been right. I mean I don't represent a _total fuckin' idiot._ "

"No, really," you answer flatly.

"Are you fuckin' serious???" he sputters. You imagine he's gesticulating wildly at this point. "Tell me you're not fuckin' serious. You're pullin' my damn leg!"

You sigh with exasperation. "No, did you even read it?"

" _Fuck_ no, the hell I care about his shitty ass script? Guy's a psycho, I should be settin' him up a meetin' with the cops, not _Dave fuckin' Lalonde,_ " he spits back. He's shaking the phone.

"It's legitimately good, I'm not even shitting you," you say, keeping your voice even. You've learned to just not engage with his hissy fits. "I just want the screenplay, if it turns out he's really that much of a freak we can just work out a deal where he's not even involved in the production. It won't be an issue."

He huffs indignantly. You hear him stomp around doing god knows what. "Well don't come cryin' to me when he murders you and fucks the corpse."

"If he murders me I'll be dead. Cadavers can't cry."

"Yeah, _that's what they want you to think._ " 

"Uh. All ... right, then." Sometimes you really have no idea how to respond to the bullshit he says. 

He sighs dramatically and begins rifling through papers on his desk. "Fine, have it your utterly nonsensical and moronic way. When you want it?"

You swivel your chair around to get a look at the schedule board up on the office wall. "Uhh, how's Saturday at 6?"

"Fine, whatever, I'll call him up and confirm."

"All right, let me know. Bye."

It's hard to slam a smartphone to hang up but _by god_ he tries.

 

***

 

tentacleTherapist [TT] began pestering turntechGodhead [TG]

TT: Hey.  
TT: I got around to reading your stalker's script.   
TG: took you long enough   
TT: I have a life, Dave.   
TG: really   
TT: It was good.  
TT: I was surprised.   
TG: yeah i told you   
TT: He needs an editor very badly, though.   
TG: youre one to talk   
TT: I'm a novelist.  
TT: While my chosen medium affords me the luxury of being able to devote hundreds upon hundreds of pages to borderline extraneous characterization, the silver screen demands a considerably more economic treatment.   
TG: whatever ill lord of the rings it if i have to  
TG: im dave fucking lalonde remember  
TG: i can do literally anything i want  
TG: if it tanks whoops i only have 10 other billion dollars  
TG: who cares   
TT: He may not agree with your cavalier position on the success of his movie.  
TT: He's still an untested amateur, promising though he may be. You should at least convey to him my criticisms so he can develop his skills as an independent writer, even if this issue may not be of tangible financial detriment to you.   
TG: yeah yeah  
TG: im meeting up with him tomorrow ill go over it all   
TT: Do you even have the rights to adapt the book yet?   
TG: hahahahaha its fucking scholastic  
TG: ill flash them 7 figures and their panties will drop instantly  
TG: they wont even ask what ill do with it   
TT: The author won't want to be involved?    
TG: nah shes like 100 years old  
TG: i wont have to pay much to make her go away   
TT: You make this sound like some sort of shady underground transaction.   
TG: well im basically buying it to utterly trash it and ruin a bunch of little girls childhoods without the creators knowledge or approval so it kinda is   
TT: You're a stand-up guy, Dave.   
TG: damn fucking straight   
TT: Anyway, keep me posted. I'm interested in seeing how this turns out.   
TG: yeah i will  
TG: talk to you later   
TT: Later.

tentacleTherapist [TT] ceased pestering turntechGodhead [TG]

 

***

"Are you going to wear the red tie or the black tie?" your mother asks as you stare into the mirror, trying to make the same decision yourself. Just because she can't see what you're doing doesn't seem to stop her from having an opinion on it.

"Mom, I'm 32 years old. I don't need you to dress me."

"You should go with the red tie. I really like that one. It makes you stand out."

You hesitate to deliberate for a moment, as if pretending you were actually going to do something other than what she told you to do, before you finally just put on the red tie.

"You need to call me more often," your mother says. It seems to be rare that your phone calls end on any other note.

You roll your eyes at no one in particular as you awkwardly tie your tie with your phone wedged between your shoulder and ear. "I call you at least three times a week, mom."

"Why don't you call me every day?" she whines. "I get so lonely in this big house without all you kids."

"I have a life," you gripe as you pull on your suit jacket, shifting your phone from ear to ear.

"Would it really kill you to spare just half an hour of your day for your poor old mother?" Her melodramatically dejected tone never fails to make you feel guilty, no matter how affected you know it is.

"It's never _just_ half an hour, mom. You've been talking at me about nothing for two now, and I'm going to be late for this meeting."

"Oh, you know it's because I miss you! You _must_ tell Rosie to call me too. You're bad enough, but that girl! I swear, it's like she forgot who I was the day she moved out!"

"She doesn't like talking on the phone. She never has. This isn't some new thing, mom."

"But I'm her mother!"

You sigh deeply. "Mom, I have to go get Aradia and head out."

Her tone immediately switches from Whiny Neglected Mother to exuberantly saccharine and leaves you a little whiplashed. "Give Aradia a big hug and a kiss from mommy, okay?"

"I don't think that would be appropriate," you dryly remark as you return the clothes you decided not to wear to your exceedingly spacious closet.

"It's from me, silly, it would be totally okay."

"Mom, I'm hanging up."

"You've been remembering to brush your teeth, right, sweetie?"

"I'm serious. I'm hanging up the phone. I'm leaving."

"I love you honey pie, mwah. Oh, and tell Eridan that his sugar cookies were delight—"

"Yes, mom, I love you too, _bye,_ " you say and finally hang up.

You haven't even gone out yet and you're already exhausted. _Jesus,_ that fucking woman.

You quickly gather up your wallet and keys as you hear a knock on your door — you're running a bit late at this point, so you figure it must be Aradia. Sure enough, when you hurry over to open the front door, your assistant is stood outside. She cleans up well; she's got her hair up in a bun that accentuates the shape of her face that's typically lost in her voluminous mane, and her deep maroon dress is conservative but flattering.

"Are you ready to go?" she asks.

"Yeah," you say as you step out into the hallway, locking the door behind you. "You look great, Aradia."

"Thank you," she evenly answers and offers her arm to yours. You walk her down to the building's parking garage where you keep your stable of egregiously expensive vehicles.

Aradia usually drives the car, since you're kind of lazy and typically want to fuck around on your phone without getting anyone killed while you do it, but she's wearing heels tonight and you decide to spare her the hassle at least for the drive _to_ the restaurant. _You'll_ be drunk on the way back, though.

You pull up at the restaurant 5 minutes after 6 and park the car in an inconvenient but inconspicuous location. You remain mildly wary of potential mobs as you and Aradia make the walk from the car around to the front of the restaurant.

The dude is waiting out front; predictably, he's clad in the same conspicuously douchebaggy getup you'd seen him in at Vanity Fair, though he regretfully seems to have foregone the bowtie and spats this time. He raises a hand in greeting as he notices the two of you approach.

"Did Eridan not tell you about the dress code?" you ask as you come to stand before him, eyebrow raised. You're surprised they didn't call the cops while he was loitering outside.

"He told me," he answers, _I just didn't give a shit_ implicit in his tone.

"It's not like this place is black tie, dude. Some slacks and a JC Penny sweater vest would have have gotten you a bare minimum pass."

He sneers at you disdainfully. "Do I look like a guy who'd wear a fuckin' sweater vest?"

"Why not? Wouldn't make you look like any more of a tool than you already do."

You were kind of just trying to be a dick, but he grins broadly at your jab anyway. Well, ok.

"Uh, well, this is Aradia, my assistant. Aradia, this is..." Shit. The hell was even his name?

"Dirk," he succinctly supplies.

"Right. This is Dirk, my stalker."

"Hello," Aradia says.

"Sup," Dirk says. He doesn't at all seem to have been fazed by being labeled your stalker. Well, at least he's honest in... some respect.

After a few moments of awkwardly standing about, you motion to the door of the restaurant. "Let's go in, yeah?"

You lead the way inside; there are a few other people sat waiting in the lobby. It's not too crowded for a Saturday evening, all things considered. 

The maitre d' stood by the front of the restaurant looks like he's shit his pants when he notices you. "Mr. Lalonde!" he calls out; you inwardly cringe as the other waiting patrons begin to mutter amongst themselves. "It's an honor to have you back again! And..."

His eyes fall on Dirk and instantaneously takes on a look like he's just smelled a rat. "This... gentleman is with you, Mr. Lalonde?" he asks, with a false politeness that makes _you_ feel smarmed.

"Yes," you say. _Is there going to be a fucking problem?_ , your face says.

He knows better than to fuck with you.

"Well, all right," he concedes, shrinking back under Dirk's threatening glower. "We're a bit busy this evening but we'll have a table for you in just a moment, don't worry."

You don't like to make reservations; the paparazzi inevitably seems to always get wind, so you opt for a walk-in and put up with the wait. You always get bumped up line, anyway; you've never been to a place you couldn't get into in under 20 minutes. Predictably, the other waiting patrons give you hateful glares when you're called to be seated in a fourth of the time they'd been waiting.

You're led to your table, which is located in a discrete corner of the restaurant away from the heaviest customer traffic. You survey the surrounding tables quickly for any familiar faces, and are relieved to come up empty; other VIPs are typically bolder about bothering you than the regular clientele, who are rich enough to be accustomed to the occasional celebrity appearance but not self-important enough to think you actually want to talk to them. Nevertheless, you settle into your seat with your back to the room; may as well spare yourself the embarrassment of seeing all of the haughty patrons scornfully attempting to burn off Dirk's inappropriate attire with their eyes alone.

The server comes around with the menu and wine list almost as soon as you've sat down. You choose a champagne apéritif; Aradia asks for water, and Dirk specifies tap. You laugh when he gives his order — Aradia at least has the excuse of being the sober driving bitch.

"I'm paying for this whole thing, dude, you can order whatever you want. The Prosecco is —"

He's quick to cut you off. "Nah, don't drink." He looks back to the server, who is still standing about nervously. (You don't recognize him; must be new.) "You're not too much of a fancy fuck to turn on a tap, right? Do I gotta ask you to pull it up out of a well in Sicily?"

"I —" he starts, taken aback. You should probably be telling Dirk off, but the look on the server's face is so funny you have to try very hard not to laugh.

"That'll be all for now, thanks," you tell him. You wait for the nonplussed server to leave before you turn back to Dirk, amused. "What, you an alcoholic?"

"Funny how you came to that conclusion before 'he just doesn't like alcohol'," he says, donning a particularly smug smirk.

You snort. "Everybody likes alcohol."

Dirk forces a disdainful laugh before he replies with controlled scorn, "Booze turns you into a drooling fucking retard. Takes away your edge and replaces it with brash idiocy. My mind's the best thing I've got, drownin' it in swill until I'm a loud idiot fool who can't see two feet in front of his own face isn't my idea of _fun._ "

Well, you can't say the guy doesn't have balls. His candidly blunt demeanor is so out of the ordinary that you're more entertained than insulted; does he have _any_ concept of how a normal person would act around you? You laugh it off. "It's just _wine,_ man. Isn't like we're gonna get sloshed on this shit, unless you've got the tolerance of a tiny asian schoolgirl."

Aradia looks at you quizzically. "Are you implying something?"

"Am I? I can never get enough in you to find out. I'm just assuming you're two beers away from a Girls Gone Wild appearance until you prove otherwise, no other logical explanation I can see for your freakish degree of self-control."

"I suppose it'd be out of line for me to suggest you're projecting."

"If only I were young and pretty enough for Girls Gone Wild. I'm just a washed up old ho now, reduced to sucking dicks in the dumpster behind Taco Bell."

" _In_ the dumpster?"

"Not even the meth addicted hood rats want to be seen with me. I've _really_ hit rock bottom."

Your immature sniggering is interrupted as the sommelier comes around with your champagne. Immediately transitioning from 14 year old boy to the cultured aficionado that is expected of a gentleman of your status, you go through the whole pompous song and dance of tasting the wine; Dirk looks on at you with an expression of mildly disgusted disdain you'd expect if you were picking your nose at the table. By the time the sommelier leaves, you're confident you've done a sufficient job in convincing him you're not a grown manchild with a career founded, built and sustained by dick jokes.

You flip open your heretofore ignored dinner menu as you contentedly sip your champagne. Aradia and Dirk follow your lead shortly after, though it isn't long before Dirk complains.

"I can't read a fucking word of this," he mutters, visibly discomforted.

"It's Italian," you say.

"Yeah, I figured that out. I don't _speak_ Italian, is the problem."

You flip through your own menu back to the antipasti and look for something to suggest. You figure skipping the entire salad section is a safe bet. "Uhh... do you like prosciutto?"

"What is that _in English?_ "

"Um..."

"Prosciutto is thinly sliced dry-cured ham. It's served with melons, here," Aradia evenly supplies.

He scans the menu until he finds it. "30 fucking dollars for an appetizer," he breathes, a look of disbelief on his face.

This isn't even the most expensive restaurant you even _go_ to. You humor taking him to an even more upscale locale the next time; you've never been out with someone so transparently flustered by your money. "I told you, dude, I'm picking up the bill."

"The hell do they even do to the shit to make it worth that much? Douse it in the piss of captured angels?"

"It's not that much. I'll be dropping at least a thousand on the wine," you offer unprompted.

He looks at you like you have six heads.

You lift the menu again to conceal what threatens to become a shit-eating grin. "So, you want to have that or is there something else you'd rather get?"

Dirk gives a cursory look back down before shrugging noncommittally. "Whatever, doubt I'd like the rest of that garbage any better."

"All right. Main course. You a meat guy? How about agne— lamb, you like lamb?"

The corner of his lip curls.

"... Okay, then. Veal milanese? There's filet mignon with porcini —"

"They don't have a fuckin' cheeseburger or something?"

You can't stop yourself from busting out laughing this time.

"Dave," Aradia sighs. The other patrons are starting to stare at you; you notice Dirk has stiffened considerably, though he takes great care to maintain his blank facade.

You compose yourself, shifting your shades to wipe at your eyes. "Get the filet, it's just a fancy steak. I'm sure even you'll be able to stomach it."

"Fine, whatever."

You close your menu. "You want it rare or medium rare?"

"Well done."

It's your turn to gawk.

"I'm not paying for you to ruin a fifty dollar cut of meat."

"Oh, you're willing to bust a grand on grape juice but suddenly fifty's _too much_ for an edible steak?" 

" _Edible?_ Dude, you may as well order a fucking brick," you protest indignantly.

"S'how I like it."

"You can burn all the ten dollar Outback steaks you want on your own dime, I won't be aiding and abetting in your masochistic crusade against cuisine. Get the medium rare."

Dirk rolls his eyes dramatically. "No."

"Come on, at least do medium."

"No."

"Not even _Hitler_ would've ordered well done."

"Right, Hitler was a vegetarian and basically a pussy. Not seeing your point."

"This is the most horrible thing anyone's ever made me do —"

"'Scuse me for wanting my meat to actually be _cooked_ —"

Your argument is interrupted when the waiter returns. "Are you ready to order?" he asks graciously, though you catch the wary glance he throws in Dirk's direction. You give him a scathing one of your own before you order. 

You look to Aradia and ask her if she'll be having the usual; when she nods, you turn back to the server. "Yeah. We'll have the insalata di rucola, bruschetta and prosciutto e melone antipasti, then for the main Aradia and I'll each have agnello medium rare, and..." You grimace. "He wants the medaglioni di manzo, well done."

The server seems to have a similar reaction to yours. "May I suggest medium ra—"

You massage your temples. "I tried to tell him, he wouldn't listen. Tell the chef he's going through chemo and is afraid of parasites if it'll make it any easier for him."

The waiter turns to Dirk. "Sir, I assure you that there are no parasites in our meat."

"He knows," you sigh.

"If... you're sure."

"Yeah, I'm fuckin' sure," Dirk says, doing a swell job of looking hideously self-satisfied.

"... All right." With a wince, the server turns back to you. "Do you have an idea of which wines you'd like to order?"

You order a glass of Pinot Grigio with the antipasti and a ludicrously expensive bottle of Barolo with the main course; Dirk surreptitiously scans the wine list for the one you named and pales visibly at the listed price.

"It's what you pay for the vintage," you pronounce once the server leaves with the menus, leaning back in your chair like the smug dick you very much are. Dirk looks like he's struggling to conceal the fact he's just eaten a particularly rotten lemon.

"So," you eventually say, after the silence that settles over the three of you threatens to verge into uncomfortable. "Tell me about yourself."

"The hell does it matter who I am? My work should speak for itself," he quickly returns.

"I'm curious," you say, looking back into the blackness of his own shades. They do nothing to shroud the intensity of his gaze; you don't much like looking people in the eye, but it's plain that he doesn't have any such problem. It unnerves you a little, but you do your best to hide your discomfort. "Besides, you seem to have more than a passing interest in me, given how fucking hard you tried to get my attention. Seems fair I should get to ask a thing or two about you. How the hell did you get into the Vanity Fair party?"

"Bought a ticket."

"You don't just 'buy a ticket' to Vanity Fair. Those things run tens of thousands of dollars. You don't seem like the kinda guy who has that much money to burn."

"I made do," he replies, tone betraying nothing. The guy is not very forthcoming.

"What do you do for a living?" you ask. _Where the hell do you work that wouldn't fire you in a half day?_ , you _want_ to ask.

His stoic demeanor doesn't crack in the least when he answers, like it was the most natural thing in the world to say. "I run a porn site."

You immediately look to Aradia to see she'd done the same to you, and the statement lingers in the air for a few moments before you crack up. "You're shitting me."

Dirk leans back in his chair and crosses his arms over his chest. "Nah. Plushrump.com."

"Are you like, an... actor?" you ask, incredulous. You hadn't pegged him for a porn star. His rump _is_ pretty plush, though, you'll give him that. 

"I'm a director." 

You can't help but snort with laughter again; the corner of his lip curls up in disdain before you compose yourself. "I'm sorry, I just... hahaha, oh _man_."

"You done?" he asks, eyebrow raised. He looks a hair's breadth away from a tirade about Hollywood elitism. 

"Yeah, let's — let's just move on. How old are you?"

He hesitates before he answers this time. "Forty-five."

Jesus. He's only five years younger than your mother. 

"You ever written any screenplays before?"

"Nah. First time. Written maybe three stories my entire life and this's the only one I ever bothered to finish."

"I'm surprised," you say, and you mean it; he could do with some refinement, but he's obviously got a lot of skill. He must spend much more time reading than your average popped collar toting douchebag.

"If I regularly did everything I'm good at I'd have no time left in the day," he replies, donning the most smug and self-satisfied smirk in the universe. The douchebag part sure isn't all irony, you surmise.

"And modest, too."

"No sense in denying the truth."

Before you can conjure up another boundlessly witty reply, the waiter arrives with your antipasti and wines. You need to taste it again, which Dirk does not appear to tire of detesting. You thank the waiter and quickly attack your food (Aradia is much more polite about it), but Dirk hesitates.

"What _is_ this?" Dirk growls, looking down at his plate as if he were a five year old staring into a mountain of brussel sprouts.

"It's prosciutto. It's ham," Aradia says.

"It looks like raw bacon."

"Ham is meat cut from the thigh of the pig. Bacon is typically cut from the belly."

"I said it _looks_ like raw bacon, not that it _is_. I'm not fuckin' stupid."

"Pardon me. I didn't mean to assume," she politely replies, returning to her salad. Aradia's tone always remains so even and cordial that people often don't catch her little digs, but the grin you throw at her makes Dirk furrow his brow. You like to think you taught her that.

"Just eat the damn thing, it's not like a Wall Street banker is going to bust out of the folds," you laugh before shoving your mouth full of food.

You watch him with condescending interest as he tentatively pokes at the meat (with his salad fork; you don't bother to correct him). He raises a piece of it to his mouth and, with the look of a man held at gunpoint, slowly begins to chew. The expression of revulsion that gradually blooms on his face is a spectacle.

You raise an eyebrow. "It's just ham, dude." 

"It tastes like a rubbery raw piece of shit."

"Prosciutto _is_ raw."

"I don't think it's strictly accurate to call it _raw._ Though it's not cooked, it's dry cured," Aradia says.

Dirk looks like he's about to be sick. You roll your eyes.

"Here, if you're not going to eat it, give it to me," you say; you'd already made quick work of your bruschetta. The portions in this place are pretty small, especially given the prices.

He immediately pushes the plate across the table, which you take and waste no time beginning to eat. It's certainly not the best prosciutto you've ever had; it's kind of stringy and and chewy but it's not nearly as bad as his histrionic reaction made it out to be. He nevertheless watches you with a disgusted look you'd expect if you were pulling up the maggot-stuffed innards out of a rotted cat's carcass.

It's not long after you've finished Dirk's prosciutto that the waiter returns with the main course. Dirk eyes your thousand dollar wine with disbelieving skepticism; you raise your glass to him with a mockingly gleeful grin, to which he rolls his eyes and simply begins to eat his food. Despite the fact his meat looks to be the consistency of concrete, he at least seems to find it palatable.

"All right, we should probably get down to talking about your script at some point," you say after the three of you take a few minutes' break from childish bickering to eat; you're starting to verge on tipsy from the wine, and at your most confident. "Look, here's how it is. I like it, and I want to pick it up, but there are a couple of issues we'll need to work out."

Dirk looks up at you attentively (he chews with his mouth open and it's kind of grossing you out). If you didn't know any better, you'd say he looks almost _enthusiastic_. "Like what?" he asks, voice somewhat muffled by the food he didn't bother to swallow before he spoke.

"Mainly, how _fucking long_ it is. You've stuffed it full of so much content that it's pushing a runtime that's really not feasible for this kind of film."

Aaand then he immediately closes up. Just from his kneejerk reaction you can tell this guy doesn't handle criticism very graciously. His jaw locks up and his tone when he responds is challenging. "And?"

"And you're going to have to make some deep cuts," you say, before pausing to chew your lamb. You make a show of not speaking and not leaving your mouth hanging open as you chew, hoping he might follow by example, but he doesn't. "Ideally I'd want to shoot for 90 minutes for this sort of thing, at _most_ two hours. I'm not putting out War and Peace."

"But everything in there is important," he objects. You laugh; he sounds like you after you've finished every script you've ever written.

"No, it's not. You think it is, because you wrote it and you're married to every little part and I _know_ how that is, but it's not, there's always something you can axe. And _will_ be axed, whether you think it's for the best or not. But on the terms of things the film _would_ benefit from a cut, we could probably lose Lulu Sanders's parts entirely —"

"What, are you crazy?" he interrupts you defensively. "No, she's instrumental in convincing Anna's mother to keep Shadow. Plus, you can't cut out a whole fuckin' Pony Pal, there can't only be two Pony Pals, that's stupid."

You do your best to keep your tone level and nonthreatening as you reply, "Those parts could easily be rewritten for Pam Crandal. You have a lot of screen time dedicated to Lulu that ultimately doesn't weave into the primary narrative at all. Her entire presence is an irrelevant B plot that, even if it's not necessarily _detracting_ from the film, doesn't service it in any notable way beyond increasing the run time which is going to make it much more expensive to produce and curtail the frequency of showings we'll get in the opening weeks. The monetary hit we'll take for keeping those parts isn't worth a trade off of _fucking nothing._ "

He snorts. "The hell does it matter to you? I don't give a shit about the money, and it's not like you have any need to penny pinch."

"Look, you're totally ignoring the realities of film making here," you say, growing more forceful and bold with your statements. "Yeah, I'm a magical fucking money fairy, I could push out an 8 hour long trash reel and it wouldn't mean shit to my wallet, but if you want to have any fucking career unattached to my disgusting piles of cash you're going to have to learn how to work with the constraints of film and remain conscientious of monetization. I'm not going to keep you as a pet, dude."

"But I don't want to compromise the —"

"But you wouldn't _be_ compromising anything. Cutting Lulu's parts would _improve_ it, they're not necessary to this film at all."

"They're necessary to the integrity of the character and her role in the Pony Pals series. I was pullin' from some of the other books where she has larger parts."

"If Detective Pony is successful, there's no reason you couldn't expand on Lulu in sequels that actually utilize her in the plot. Yeah, it's smart to make considerations for building a cohesive franchise, but you can't _completely ignore_ the stand-alone value of the film. You don't have to cut her character entirely but you should drop her plotline and reign her in more to the peripheral."

From what you can tell, you're pretty sure you've beaten him down. He moves on to another, much weaker angle. "Would they even let us make a sequel? I shit all over the book."

"See, that's where my disgusting cash comes in," you say, grinning. "We'll get free reign, doesn't matter what it costs me to get it. Hell, I'll buy the entire copyright if have to. If it sells — which it will, because it'll have my fucking name on it — I'll get you sequels greenlit out the ass."

Dirk deliberates for a while before he finally grumbles his concession. "All right, I'll see what I can do with it."

"All right, then," you say. Aradia long finished her lamb, and what's left of yours grew cold when you forgot it in your argument; you flag down the waiter for the check. "So, yeah, consider this a deal. I'll have to formally purchase the rights before we can actually work out a contract, but I'll keep in touch with you about the revisions. Just call Eridan when you're ready to go over it."

"Can I just call you about it? Your manager is an ass," Dirk complains. 

The waiter brings over your bill and takes away your plates. "Man, I can't just hand out my number," you reply, not looking up from where you're working out the tip. You'll be making at least one person very happy tonight. "I start doing that and it's not long before it leaks and I need to get a new one if I want to sleep."

"I ain't like that. C'mon, I don't wanna have to deal with havin' that schlep shout at me about Shrek."

You glance up and snort. "You got him while he was watching Shrek? No wonder he was shitting his pants."

"The fuck is wrong with that guy?"

"I wouldn't even know where to begin," you answer dryly. The server comes around and takes the check pad to run your card.

As you wait for the business to be done, you pause and look at him warily. "... Do you have Pesterchum?" you ask. You totally emphasize with his lack of desire to interface with Eridan, and it's not like it's a big hassle to block people or change your handle on Pesterchum.

"I can get it."

"Aradia, do you have a pen in your purse?" you ask, turning to your assistant. She nods and begins to rifle through her bag. "I'll write my chumhandle down for —"

"Nah, just tell me what it is. I'll remember it," Dirk states. Aradia stops and looks to you inquiringly.

Well, if he forgets, he'll just have to deal with the dumb bastard. "Uh, ok then. It's turntechGodhead."

"Got it."

The waiter comes back with your card; you thank him and move to get up, and Aradia is quick to support your weight when you predictably wobble on your feet. You somehow managed to get through the whole bottle of Barolo by yourself at some point. "I keep overdoing it," you grouse.

Aradia sighs. "Dave, there's very little you don't overdo."

 

***

 

You arrive back at your apartment around 9 PM, and you kind of feel like you've been hit by a truck, even if it's not that late. Your sleep schedule is fucked and messing with your head, and your tipsiness doesn't help; you're not _that_ drunk, but you're drunk enough to accidentally slam into the corner of your dining table and bruise your leg to shit, which you complain about loudly enough that Aradia has to come back over to make sure you aren't dying.

Once you've assured her of your safety and she retires back to her own apartment, you stagger into the bathroom to take a spectacularly long piss. When you come back out through the bedroom, you spare a contemplative glance at the bed — you're exhausted, but upon deliberation decide you're not actually _tired,_ so you make your way into your office and slump into your chair in front of your computer. You check your email, decide not to actually read any of your emails, and click through a bunch of shitty pointless websites instead.

Then you remember dinner.

Seized by a morbid curiosity, you type plushrump.com into the URL field.

Oh.

Oh... wow.

_What the fuck?_

You were expecting, you know, _porn._ Maybe some mildly weird gay fetish porn, even. Instead, you find yourself navigating through the pages of the website in a daze. This is honest to god _puppet porn._ Littered across your screen are images of puppets placed in compromising positions, presumably for the purpose of people actually getting off to. Holy shit.

You hand moves of its own accord to the premium video preview section.

 

***

 

turntechGodhead [TG] began pestering tentacleTherapist [TT]

TG: http://www.plushrump.com/   
TT: ... What?   
TG: click on it   
TT: I did.  
TT: Thank you for the generous faceful of foam ass, I guess?   
TG: youre welcome   
TT: Where on Earth did you even find this thing?   
TG: at dinner today  
TG: because  
TG: guess whose stalker runs it???   
TT: Oh wow.   
TG: no kidding  
TG: anyway he supposedly makes a living off this shit  
TG: selling puppet porn to internet perverts  
TG: and  
TG: get this  
TG: he actually made a couple of sbahj porn parodies  
TG: like with puppets   
TT: I don't think I should ask for a link, but I'm going to.  
TT: Damn my infernal curiosity.   
TG: im on my phone i dont have them  
TG: just google it though therere clips on slutload  
TG: "skank bro and hussy jeff"  
TG: "sbahj: felt sluts"  
TG: "the new freinds big juicy black cock"   
TT: Oh my god.  
TT: This is...  
TT: What am I watching?   
TG: art rose  
TG: its art   
TT: Oh.  
TT: That's his penis, isn't it?  
TT: That puppet is way too small for  
TT: Wow, okay.   
TG: yeah   
TT: It's so...  
TT: Large.   
TG: ok  
TG: am i crazy or is he sort of hot   
TT: All I can see is his dick.  
TT: I'd kinda need to see the rest of him to make a judgment.   
TG: its a really nice dick   
TT: To be honest, I've always thought penises were pretty ugly.   
TG: what   
TT: They're kind of gross veiny tubes with a mushroom on top.  
TT: I just don't get the appeal.   
TG: thats the most ignorant thing ive ever heard anyone say  
TG: like i dont even know where to start  
TG: dicks are amazing whats wrong with you   
TT: They serve their intended purpose.  
TT: I just don't think they're much to look at.   
TG: i dont know you   
TT: I'm sorry?  
TT: I didn't know penile aesthetics was such an important subject to you.   
TG: i didnt know you had terrible taste  
TG: hahahahahahaha actually yeah i did  
TG: anyway hes pretty cut  
TG: nice ass  
TG: 7/10 maybe 8 if he wouldnt dress like a tool  
TG: this is my post dicklust assessment though i never really even thought about it until i saw those vids  
TG: maybe hell drop down when i look upon him with freshly masturbated eyes   
TT: The idea you're having is a really bad idea.   
TG: what idea   
TT: The one where you sleep with him.   
TG: whoa lets not get ahead of ourselves  
TG: just because i can appreciate the package doesnt mean ive gotta sample the goods   
TT: With you?  
TT: Yes, it does.   
TG: rose are you calling me a slut   
TT: Yes, Dave, I am calling you a slut.   
TG: oh come on   
TT: I'm fairly certain that every time you've ever confided your attraction to another person to me, I've been treated to a direly unwanted description of your new sex life with her within a week.   
TG: yeah her  
TG: hes not hot enough to be worth the media shitstorm that would ensue if anyone found out i was fucking a dude   
TT: That's what you said about Kim Kardashian.   
TG: ugh  
TG: that wasnt me that was the ecstasy   
TT: Sure.   
TG: palmela handerson and rosie palms are more than enough for me right now  
TG: life as an ambidextrous masturbator is highly demanding   
TT: Thank you so much for that.  
TT: I really needed to know that exact detail about your life.   
TG: youre welcome  
TG: anyway im going to go jack off again and fall asleep  
TG: ill be sure to think of you while i switch hands   
TT: Now I see why you named one of them after me.   
TG: wait  
TG: wow that came out wrong  
TG: rosie palms is just like a thing i didnt even  
TG: and i mean just the part where im switching hands  
TG: id be thinking of  
TG: this conversation  
TG: you wouldnt be the actual subject of  
TG: i cant salvage this its the hindenburg  
TG: goodnight 

turntechGodhead [TG] ceased pestering tentacleTherapist [TT]


	3. Chapter 3

There are few things in this world that piss you off more than being put on hold.

You stand in the middle of your living room at your wit's end. Nauseating elevator music blasts cheerfully out of your phone, the same obnoxious fucking tune you've suffered to listen to for at least 4 hours over the last two days, and you survive five more minutes before you've had enough.

You angrily disconnect from your phone and call your lawyer. The phone rings and rings and rings and you are _so very tired of waiting_.

A scan of your Chumroll shows that she's signed into Pesterchum, though, so you try pestering her instead. 

turntechGodhead [TG] began pestering gallowsCalibrator [GC]

TG: pyrope   
TG: why wont you answer your phone   
TG: pyrope   
TG: pyrope   
TG: god damn    
GC: OH SORRY   
GC: I JUST GOT A NEW SOUND SYSTEM, I COULDNT HEAR IT RING OVER ALL THESE SICK BEATS >:]   
TG: are you going to pick up now   
GC: NOT RIGHT NOW IM BUSY   
TG: busy doing what   
TG: dancing in your bedroom in your underwear   
GC: NO IM IN THE LIVING ROOM   
TG: why do you have capslock on   
GC: MR LALONDE YOU KNOW VERY WELL THAT THE JURY HAS FOUND CAPSLOCK GUILTY OF BEING TOTALLY COOL >:]   
TG: no its pretty much the opposite of the thing that cool is   
TG: it makes you sound like a short ugly asshole   
TG: its weirding me out   
GC: WELL I LIKE IT!   
GC: WHAT DO YOU WANT DAVE   
GC: I CANT TWERK SITTING DOWN   
TG: if anyone could manage it its you pyrope   
GC: THANK YOU DAVE   
TG: pyrope scholastic is trying to jew me   
TG: i need you to take these filthy gentiles to school   
GC: UH OH   
GC: OK, YOUVE PIQUED MY INTEREST >:]   
GC: WHAT DO YOU NEED ME TO DO   
TG: ok im trying to buy the rights to adapt the pony pals series   
GC: THE PONY PALS SERIES???   
TG: yeah dont ask   
TG: ive been talking with them about it and outright dropped some figures but they think they can weasel more out of me and theyre stalling and giving me the fucking runaround   
TG: and now i think i kinda want to have a tantrum and not back down until i have the entire copyright   
TG: i need to own pony pals pyrope   
TG: can you make this happen   
TG: can you make me the happiest man alive and give me these ponies   
GC: MR LALONDE THEY DONT CALL ME THE LEGISLACERATOR FOR NOTHING >:]   
GC: HOW HIGH ARE YOU WILLING TO GO?   
TG: all   
TG: the   
TG: fucking   
TG: way   
GC: WELL THEN   
GC: YOU WILL HAVE YOUR PONIES MR LALONDE   
TG: damn fucking right i will   
TG: keep me updated   
GC: OK >:]   
GC: TALK TO YOU SOON

gallowsCalibrator [GC] ceased pestering turntechGodhead [TG]

With that out of the way, the only thing that's left for you to do is wait.

Resolving to actually get some work done today, you head into your office and pull up your script file for the next SBaHJ installment; you still only have a little bit done, and the beginnings are always the hardest for you to get through. Nevertheless, you power through and start some work.

You actually start making some headway when you're alerted to contact request on Pesterchum. With a sigh, you accept it anyway.

timaeusTestified [TT] began pestering turntechGodhead [TG]

TT: Hey.   
TG: wow   
TG: did you have to go and pick a chumhandle with the same initials as my sisters   
TT: It wasn't on purpose?   
TG: ok well if i end up drunk pestering you at 4 am about a lot of bullshit that doesnt make any sense to you dont be surprised   
TT: I'll keep that in mind.   
TG: you even type exactly like her jesus   
TT: How fuckin' else would I type?   
TG: i am demonstrating to you a way of typing that is not my sisters   
TT: You type like a moron.   
TT: It wouldn't suit me.   
TG: yeah the sass is real cute dude   
TG: did you want something   
TT: Yeah.   
TT: I did some revisions on the script.   
TG: cool send it to me   
TT: Could we meet in person about it?   
TG: why   
TG: easier if i just check it out here   
TT: I'd just like to go over it directly.   
TG: im pretty busy man   
TT: I can wait until whenever you get some free time.   
TG: ugh ok   
TG: when are you free   
TT: Any time is fine.   
TG: ok how about you come out to the production studio at 3   
TG: im due to go in and breathe down peoples necks anyway   
TT: Alright.   
TG: im sure you have the addresses of everything im involved with committed to memory so i assume dont have to tell you where it is   
TT: Yeah.   
TG: wow youre not even going to pretend to not be creepy are you   
TT: The location of your studio is public knowledge.   
TG: yeah but   
TG: fuck it nevermind   
TG: ill see you later

turntechGodhead [TG] ceased pestering timaeusTestified [TT]

However much you don't feel like going out today, you _are_ a bit curious to see him again after having perused his website. With any luck, your increasingly vague memories of his appearance will prove to be off mark and you'll be able to discard what is likely your most ill-advised sexual infatuation to date. You'll never be able to rid yourself of the knowledge you actually beat off to puppet porn, though.

With a sigh, you grab your phone and quickly dial Eridan to give him an update on your schedule change.

"Hey," you start, eager to get through this as quickly as possible.

"Hey. It's me. Eri."

"I know, Eridan. You don't need to say that every time."

You can just tell he's doing that obnoxious thing where he rolls his eyes with his whole fucking body. "What you want?"

"Letting you know I'm going up to the studio at 3 to meet with Dirk again about his script revisions. Just fill my whole day."

Eridan immediately takes on a tone of offense. "I can't believe you're going to _work_ with that guy after what he did to me," he whines. Did he fucking sniffle? This guy is unreal.

"What he did to — oh my god, Ampora, just shut the _fuck up,_ " you grit out. "He didn't kill your fucking parents, get _over_ it."

"He called me on a _Sunday!_ " Eridan huffs. "That fuckin' asshole has a lot of nerve."

With a long, frustrated sigh, you lean your head onto your palm. "Eridan, nobody is gonna think 'oh, I shouldn't call, he might cordon off an entire day of his week to marathon a series of shitty Dreamworks movies'. _No one does this._ Other normal human beings do not have the ability to read your mind and divine that you are a fucking lunatic."

You're playing with fire. The moment the words leave your mouth you can sense his disposition change to one of fury, but like fuck are you gonna put up with his shit right now.

"Shitty? _Shitty?_ " Eridan all but shrieks. "I don't think you know what you just said, Lalonde!"

"Oh, I know what I fuckin' said. Shrek is a shit movie and Shrek is a shit character."

"Listen," he spits, the volume of his voice fluctuating as the hand holding his phone trembles with rage. "Shrek is basically my fuckin' dad —"

You are merciless. "Shrek is a fictional character from an animated movie, Eridan. He's _not real._ "

There's a long moment of silence where neither of you say anything — eventually, he just _breaks_. You hear a long, anguished wail from over the phone, to which you groan with exasperation.

"Eridan, calm down." That doesn't help. He breaks into tortured, gross sobs, and it doesn't take long listening to him before the vicarious embarrassment threatens to drive you mad. "Eridan, come on — look, I'm sorry, I didn't mean —"

"Nobody will ever love me," Eridan sobs. "Shrek isn't real and I'm all, _hf, hf,_ I'm all alooo-o-o-onnnee."

You try talking to him like you would a child, as softly and as comforting as you can bring yourself to be. "You're not alone. I —" You think better of it. "Well, my mother loves you. She told me she liked your sugar cookies."

He sniffles. That seemed to have stopped the worst of his bellowing, at least. "R-really?" he asks. "She liked them?"

"Yeah. She said they were great, the best cookies she ever had."

"Wow," Eridan says, awestruck. "The best she ever had. Wow... do you think I should make her some more?"

"Sure, why not," you deadpan. 

"Wow... wow... thanks, Dave. I think — I think I'll go make your mom more cookies now."

"Yeah, you go do that. Update my schedule first, though."

"I already did," he proudly pronounces. However unbearable he may be to deal with, he _does_ at least do his actual job.

"Okay, thanks. I'm gonna go, bye."

"Bye."

With overwhelming relief, you hang up.

You've still got a few hours left before you need to go, so you return to your script. With any luck, you'll be able to get _some_ shit done with it today.

Unfortunately, luck appears to be a thing you are in dire shortage of. Just as soon as you've gotten into a rhythm again, your phone rings; you groan and check to see who's called. It's Terezi — she's back awfully soon.

"Yo, what's up," you answer after you've picked up. The line erupts into shrill cackling and you have to hold the phone away from your ear until she stops. "The fuck —"

"The deal is done, Dave," she grandiosely pronounces. "The ponies are yours."

You raise an eyebrow. "How the fuck did you manage that? It's been, what, a fucking hour? I've been fighting with them the past two days and they wouldn't give me shit."

"I'm not just good, Mr. Lalonde, I'm the _best._ "

"Well, Ms. Pyrope," you say. "My commendations on a job well fuckin' done."

"Why thank you," she trills. "I've still got to work up a contract, though. I'll get that to you in a couple days."

"Shit, that's it? I don't even have to fly out to argue with a bunch of suits?"

"Not this time."

"Great. Thank you very much."

"Yes! Talk to you later, superstar."

"Later," you echo before hanging up. You're smiling faintly when you return to your work.

 

***

 

You arrive at the studio five minutes early to discover Dirk already there.

"Hey," you greet him as you walk up to the front of the building. He nods at you in acknowledgment and pushes off from the wall he was leaning on; he's carrying around a distressingly thick print of the script.

You give him a long look.

Unfortunately, your assessment was still pretty on the money, dick-addled though it may have been. The dude is unavoidably hot. He's muscular, but not grotesquely so, the kind that comes from actual physical activity and not the strenuous life of a gym queen; even the wardrobe doesn't seem as bad as you remember. He's dressed like an obnoxious prick, but his shirt clings to the muscles of his chest and arms and his thick thighs fill out his jeans in a way you can certainly appreciate.

His face isn't as conventional, but there's something handsome about him even in his flaws; his face is lined with age and his nose has clearly been broken at least once, but it gives him character. The fact you're now aware he's hung like a horse also probably helps.

"... So, are we gonna go in or are you just going to stare at me all day?"

His words startle you out of your ogling. "Uh, oh, yeah," you mumble awkwardly.

When he turns around to push open the doors of the building, you can definitely confirm the premium status of his ass.

You quickly follow him inside; you notice the receptionist's face lights up the moment you step through the door. She waves energetically at you — you slip into your mask, the wave you return barely worth being called a wave at all. You're Dave Lalonde and you don't give a shit about anything in the universe.

You approach the front desk, Dirk trailing shortly behind, and give the receptionist your best tiny half-smirk. "Good afternoon, Ellen."

"Good afternoon, Mr. Lalonde! It's a surprise to see you today!" Ellen beams. When she notices Dirk, her enthusiasm falters a bit, but she doesn't comment. "Shall I let Ms. Peixes know you're here?"

You give a slight nod of your head. "Yeah. Let her know I'll be up in a bit."

"Can do," the receptionist replies brightly, reaching for the phone on her desk. "One moment, please." She quickly dials the number, her expression darkening as she brings the receiver to her ear. You know how that is. "Hello — yes, I'm — okay but — well —"

You give her a sympathetic look.

"Yes, I know — well, Mr. Lalonde is here — yes, right now, he's at the — he's coming up, yes." She pauses for a bit. Her face sinks deeper into a frown with every passing moment. "Yes, I'll get right on that. Thank you, yes — okay, bye." She releases a deep sigh when she hangs up the phone. " _Her Imperious Condescension_ will see you now."

"She in one of her moods?" you ask, reacquainting yourself with the biggest reason you never come in anymore, and also the biggest reason you feel guilty about it.

Ellen gives you the most pitifully forlorn look you've ever seen. "Is she ever not?"

"Point taken." You shake your head. "This is probably only going to make your day worse. Sorry."

"It's okay, I'll live. Good luck!"

You give the receptionist another small wave and make your way over to the elevator, Dirk following behind. When the doors close you hit the third floor, then glance over to Dirk. "Obviously, few things I've gotta do before we talk. Gonna go drop in with my COO and then check up on casting and HR. If you want you can just wait out by my office, or tag along, or —"

Dirk shrugs noncommittally. "I'll come."

"All right. It'll probably be boring, though."

"I don't mind."

The elevator doors open onto the third floor and the two of you step out, setting a brisk pace along the length of the building. You want to be in and out of there as quickly as possible. 

You arrive at your COO's office before long and greet the secretary sat out outside the office. "Tell Meenah I'm coming in," you say; the secretary's hand hovers over the switch on her desk, but she hesitates when her eyes fall on Dirk.

"Is he with you?" she asks, looking him up and down with a disdainfully critical eye. You hate Meenah's secretary almost as much as you hate the woman herself. It's not really a surprise; it takes another bitch to handle being the bitch's bitch.

You look to Dirk. "Just wait out here, I shouldn't be long," you say, gesturing to one of the empty chairs by the window.

Dirk nods and takes a seat. The secretary gives you this look that says, _you're going to leave this guy with me?_ But you just quirk your brow at her unsympathetically until she buzzes you in. You open the door to your COO's office and step inside. 

Jesus, what a fucking drama queen.

On the far side of the spacious office is your COO, sat behind her desk. Her chair is turned away from you, looking out the floor-to-ceiling windows that cover the length of the far wall; she apparently decided it would be a good idea to drop everything she's doing to stage the biggest cliche possible for you to walk into.

"Good afternoon, Meenah," you deadpan, coming to stand some distance from her desk. There's a chair in front of it, but you don't sit; you never lower yourself to her level if you can help it.

Like some kind of ridiculous Bond villain, she slowly swivels around to face you. Sat cross-legged in the shadow cast by her high-backed leather chair is a nightmare in a well-cut suit.

"And to what do I owe this esteemed honor, hmm?" she purrs, folding her hands primly over her knee. When you'd first met you'd pop boners every time she spoke, but after ten years of partnership you're pretty sure you've met several dogs you'd rather fuck more than her.

"What do you think?" you dryly reply, crossing your arms over your chest. "I'm getting complaints again."

"Oh, is that so?"

"Meenah, I pay you to do your _job,_ not act out your fucking megalomaniacal fantasies. This isn't a North Korean forced labor camp, it's a _produ_ —"

"It's good you came down here, I've had something I've been meaning to _discuss_ with you," she says, cutting you off and apparently ignoring everything you said.

"I wasn't fin—"

"I want you to step down."

You gawk at her. "What?"

A devilish smile works itself across her face. "I want you to step down. Make me CEO."

"Are you out of your fucking mind?" you sputter, though you can't honestly say this comes as a shock. The most surprising part is that it hadn't happened sooner.

Meenah leans back in her chair, absently twirling a lock of her incredibly abundant hair around her finger. "Am I? I don't think I am." She looks back to you, head quirked to the side. "Personally, I think it's about time. What is it that you _do_ here, exactly?"

"I —"

You fully intended to give an answer, but she cuts you off before you can even begin. Her eyes narrow and her facade starts to crack, but behind her mask is only more poison. "That's right, nothing. You do nothing." She uncrosses her legs and leans forward, glaring murder at you. "You sit in your fancy fuckin' high-rise jacking off while I _run_ this ship, and who do you think gets recognition for it? Why even pose this absurd rhetorical — _you do._ You get the fame and the money and the adoration and the _respect_ while I get dirty looks when my back is turned and _hilarious nicknames_ passed around the watercooler by incompetent buffoons not worth the runniest diarrhea shit from my ass." 

"Jesus, Meenah, when are you going to get it through your head that people hate you _because you are a nasty cunt?_ If you want respect, stop treating everyone around you like expendable garbage for you to abuse as you see fit."

Meenah throws her head back and laughs uproariously. "Oh, Dave — how did you ever get to be so naive?" She wipes the crocodile tears from her eye. "If it weren't for me this company wouldn't even _exist,_ and don't pretend for a fucking second you don't know that as well as I do. The reason you can be the soft little pussy you are is _because of me,_ because _I_ make every hard decision you're too much of a coward to. That fortune of yours? That's _my fucking hard work,_ in your bank account. Does that really seem fair to you?"

You sneer incredulously. "I pay you millions of fucking dollars a year, what are you complaining about?"

"It's not about the money."

"But you just —"

"It's not _money_. It's _something that belongs to me._ "

"That's complete bullshit! I _make_ the movies we sell, I write them and shoot them and promote them, you wouldn't even have a product without —"

"And where do you think those opportunities came from? You were a no-name art house director who couldn't put together two dollars that didn't come out of your mother's bank account before I came along and _made everything that you do now possible_. You really think you're the most wealthy director in America just because you've got a cute face and a couple shitty movies under you belt?"

You drag your hand down your face, groaning in frustration. "You are _impossible_."

"True enough," she coyly replies, leaning back in her chair. You can sense the outrage dissipating, or at least retreating behind the curtain, as she slips back into her illusion of eloquent propriety. You don't know why she plays the act around you; you remember the childish rebellious girl of her youth, and you know her well enough to know that she never really changed. Maybe it's a lie she tells even to herself. 

"Listen," you growl, rounding on her. You glare down at her where she sits, and she stares straight back with unflinching defiance. "I don't care what kind of delusional fantasies you've invented in your empty head, this is _still my company_ and you are _still my subordinate_ and it's still your job to _do what I fucking say_. So sit down, shut the _fuck_ up and _for the love of god,_ start acting like an _actual human being._ If I have any more secretaries calling my manager to bawl their eyes out, I'll —"

"What, you'll fire me?" she laughs. "This company wouldn't last a month without me."

You hate her the most when she's right.

"I will, if I have to," you grit out, though you'd be lying if you said you were completely confident in that threat. "Reign it in the fuck in so it doesn't have to come to that, Meenah."

A tense moment follows where the both of you stare each other in the eye, unflinching and unyielding. Meenah eventually breaks the silence with a reluctant accession. "... All right," she says, but the glint in her dark eyes tells you this is far from over.

Nevertheless, there's not much more for you to do, so you compose yourself and prepare to depart. "Well, if there aren't any other ridiculous power grabs you'd like to spring on me, that'll be all."

"As you will."

You turn to go and make your way to the door; your hand is on the doorknob when she calls out to you again. "Oh, it's my daughter's birthday today. Did you get her a gift?"

"No," you say, pausing to look back at her. You feel bad for forgetting.

"What a shame. She likes you." With a final parting smirk, she slowly swivels her chair back away from you. "She's really quite a fool."

 

***

 

"So," Dirk says as the two of you stand in the elevator on your ascent up from casting. "I wanna ask what that shit with your COO was about, but It's kinda none of my business."

"You're right, it's not."

"Yeah. So what was that shit with your COO about?"

You look over at him and give him a _look_. He just raises his eyebrows and shrugs.

"Not much to say about it, really." The elevator dings, the doors slide open and you step out onto the floor. "My COO is a nightmare and a disgusting human being but she's irreplaceable so I can't do anything about it."

"Oh," is all Dirk says. He follows you down to your office.

You flick on the light once you step inside (and you leave the door open behind you — you're still kind of wary of him revealing himself to be an axe murderer). It's modern and spacious with a large window on the far wall overlooking the city — and also unusually neat, on account of the fact you practically never actually use it. Your desk is off in the left-hand corner of the room by the window, bereft of the typical clutter and disarray that normally categorizes any of the places you inhabit. You have a liquor cabinet on the far right end of the room that mysteriously diminishes in stock every time you come back into the building, but you've never mustered up the energy to give a shit.

In the center of the room is a coffee table surrounded by a couch and a pair of black leather chairs; you used to sleep on that couch a lot when you'd first established the company, but now that you've delegated most of the operations to Meenah, it doesn't see much use.

"Here, sit down and show me what you've changed," you say, flopping down on the couch after you've swiped a red pen off of your desk. You put your feet up on the table and take the script from Dirk as he settles down next to you — he, of course, opts to sit uncomfortably close. You raise your eyebrow at him but that garners no response, so you just roll your eyes and flip through the papers in your hands.

"I cut all of the scenes about Lulu and Snow White's history," Dirk starts. "I also reduced her lines in most of the main scenes, and rewrote a bunch of scenes that worked but could be shorter."

"Okay, show me."

You spend a few hours pretty much going through the whole script, scribbling over the pages with your various suggestions. The basic story structure and dialogue is pretty solid after the revisions, but going through it on a more microscopic level you catch some things that would conflict logistically with the shooting and directorial process that he wasn't aware of. By the time you're through to the end of the stack, the whole thing is covered in red.

You hand the script back to him for the last time and laugh when he looks down at it with a daunted expression. "That's show business, kid." 

He rolls his eyes at you.

"Oh, I figure I may as well tell you now — I've pretty much got the copyright to Pony Pals in the bag, just waiting for my lawyer to write up the contract. After that's finalized we can make the deal official."

"Cool."

"Shooting's probably going to have to wait until 2013 or so, though, I've already made a commitment to SBaHJ for this year and next. After that I'll be able to squeeze it in to direct, though."

When you finish, you realize you've kinda... got your arm up on the back rest sort of behind him? You guess it got up there while you were leaning over to look through the script. You haven't like, slung yourself over his shoulders or anything, but it's sort of there, and maybe that's weird? Would it be weirder if you noticed and made a deal out of it and moved it and then _he_ noticed and —

"... You okay, dude?" Dirk asks, and you nearly jump.

"Oh, yeah," you say, taking the opportunity to withdraw your arm and sit up awkwardly straight on the couch. "So, uh. I think that's everything."

"Okay."

He doesn't make a move to get up, and neither do you. He just _stares_ at you unmoving and you can't tell what the fuck he's actually thinking because of his shades, and you sit paralyzed and stare back and wait for him to do _anything,_ but he doesn't, and eventually you grow so uncomfortable that you just stand up.

"I'll walk you out," you hurriedly say, and he nods and follows you as you lead.


	4. Chapter 4

TT: Meenah Peixes is literally the worst human being I've ever met in my life.   
TG: yeah i know

In a shining example of the useful delegation of your time, you're sat in front of the television watching a rousing rerun of Toddlers & Tiaras. You've got a bag of Cheetos in one hand and your phone in the other, texting with one thumb to avoid getting orange garbage all over your phone.

TT: It wasn't like you didn't know how she was.  
TT: Why on Earth did you give her so much responsibility?   
TG: i didnt know she was THIS bad   
TT: Oh, that's a riot.  
TT: Need we trek down memory lane?   
TG: look she got shit done  
TG: when i asked her to work with me i thought i dunno shed just be kind of a bitch to everybody and complain a lot  
TG: which she also does  
TG: but i didnt realize she was going to fucking fetishize the suffering of all of my employees and start plotting to actually overthrow me   
TT: Why does she even want to be CEO?  
TT: It isn't as her duties would actually change. It'd be entirely a symbolic gesture.   
TG: yeah thats exactly what she wants  
TG: shes pissed that she runs the company but i get the credit for it as CEO  
TG: and idk if it were anyone else but her maybe shed have a point  
TG: but shed run the company into the ground without someone to keep her in check  
TG: if i stepped down shed just give me some powerless title and castrate me  
TG: shes pretty much the only reason ive kept it at this point   
TT: I think it's due time you replaced her.   
TG: dude if i knew anybody who could do her job half as well as she does shed have been gone years ago   
TT: Train someone.   
TG: who  
TG: how   
TT: Honestly, even putting Eridan in charge would probably be a step up.   
TG: yeah thatd be fantastic  
TG: id be able to look forward to a long future of shrek spinoffs  
TG: hold on somebody else is pestering me   
TT: I'll let you go. I've got things to do, anyway.   
TG: k

tentacleTherapist [TT] ceased pestering turntechGodhead [TG]

 

timaeusTestified [TT] began pestering turntechGodhead [TG]

TT: Are you free today?   
TG: yeah why   
TT: I'd like to hang out.  
TT: Just for fun, without the movie shit.

You hesitate.

You get up and move to the kitchen, closing the bag of Cheetos to put them away. You stare at your phone as you wash away the gross stickiness of your thoroughly licked Cheeto hand in the sink, and eventually settle on a noncommittal reply.

TG: i dunno   
TT: Why not?

You flop back down onto the couch, turn off the nauseating reality programming and sigh. Eventually, you decide on just telling him the truth.

TG: ok well if im gonna do this honesty bullshit  
TG: i think youre pretty cool  
TG: but youre also massively fucking creepy  
TG: so  
TG: kinda hesitant to be alone with you  
TG: id just rather my life not include the plot of misery at any point  
TT: I'm not going to hurt you.  
TT: Or do anything to you you don't want me to do, for that matter.  
TG: its not like you wouldnt say that even if you were going to  
TT: Well, what the hell would I get out of it?  
TT: I like you and your work and I'd like to be your friend.  
TT: Murdering you ain't gonna help with that.  
TG: but is being my friend really all you want  
TT: What's that supposed to mean?  
TG: uh  
TT: I don't give a shit about your money.  
TT: It's the worst thing about you, really.  
TT: I'd like you better if you weren't a rich fucking snob. It's not like I have any desire to leech off your cash and become another fat insipid pig gorged on unearned decadence.  
TG: see this doesnt really jive with the whole supposed "lets be friends" motive either   
TG: if you think calling me a rich fucking snob is going to get you into my good graces how do i know you wont decide that id just love a fork in my eyeball  
TT: Jesus, are you fuckin' retarded?  
TG: ...  
TT: Just because I like you doesn't mean I'm going to kiss your lily white ass when your shit stinks.  
TG: great  
TG: poop metaphors  
TG: my favorite  
TT: If you have a problem with me speaking my mind, you can go fuck yourself.  
TG: it doesnt bother me  
TG: i just  
TG: dont know what the fuck youre about  
TT: I told you what I'm about.  
TT: Why do I have to have some shady ulterior motive?  
TG: well for one you basically stalk me  
TT: I'm a fan.  
TG: yeah i picked up on that  
TT: Give me a chance.  
TT: We can go somewhere public, if you want. Isn't like I would be able to do anything to you in broad daylight.  
TG: uggghhh  
TG: ok  
TG: where would we even go  
TG: i assume youre not willing to put up with some other five star restaurant  
TT: God no.  
TG: where then  
TG: its not like i can really go out in most public places  
TG: anyone notices who i am and wed just be fending off teenage girls who want me to autograph their tits all night  
TT: How often do you even venture out into the establishments us lowly plebeians frequent?  
TG: uh  
TG: i dont  
TT: I really think you're overestimating the amount anyone gives a shit about you.  
TT: I'm sure it seems like you're the biggest fucking deal on the planet when you're flouncing around your self-congratulatory charity benefits and award parties and squalid celebutante haunts, but in the real world, the universe doesn't actually revolve around you.  
TG: im kinda a household name dude  
TG: ive been noticed in public before thats WHY i dont go out anymore  
TT: Stop deliberately drawing attention to yourself and it won't be a problem.  
TG: what  
TG: i dont deliberately draw attention to myself  
TT: Haha.  
TT: You do.  
TT: You crave the attention. You wouldn't know how to handle five minutes in a place where everybody wasn't all over your dick.   
TG: jesus christ youre an asshole  
TT: Meet me at fucking Denny's in an hour.

timaeusTestified [TT] ceased pestering turntechGodhead [TG]

TG: why the fuck do you think im going to go  
TG: you didnt even tell me which dennys  
TG: dude there are like 20 fucking dennys in LA  
TG: you seriously left  
TG: wow  
TG: you are a grade a fucking shit weasel you know that

turntechGodhead [TG] ceased pestering timaeusTestified [TT]

 

***

 

You show up anyway.

There _are_ a ton of Denny's, but you realize the chances of him not showing up to the one closest to where you live are pretty much 0, because he's a fucking crazy stalker and probably an axe murderer and you're a _fucking idiot_ but you drive out anyway, alone, and sure fucking enough he's there in the parking lot waiting for you.

Dirk makes his way over to you as you park your car in a space. You get out and whirl around, prepared to bitch him out, but upon the sight of you he frowns and furrows his brow and takes a much more determined pace in his gait. 

"See, this is what I fucking mean," he growls as he comes up before you. You immediately tense up and press back against the door of your car, flinch when his hand shoots out towards you — but his fingers simply settle around your tie and begin gently easing it from around your neck.

"What are you —" you breathe, shocked. He slings your tie over his shoulder and unbuttons your jacket. "What the fuck!"

He snorts dismissively. "See, you come out here in your fanciest fucking car in full fucking costume," he says, working at the top few buttons of your shirt. You shudder when his fingers brush against your collar. "If you'd use _common damn fucking sense_ maybe you'd realize why you stick out like a sore thumb, but _nope._ "

You stare at him dumb-founded as he swipes your shades off your face, ruffles your carefully done hair to thoroughly mess it up, and then moves to push your jacket off your shoulders. "Come on, cooperate," he urges you. You blink dumbly for a moment before you assist in taking it off; he then quickly turns to the car door, opens it, drops your jacket and glasses on the car seat and then slams the door shut again. You'd complain about wrinkles if you weren't so thoroughly flustered — he worsens the matter when he runs his hands up your sides to untuck your shirt.

"There," he pronounces, as if proud of his work.

You are apparently fifteen fucking years old and desperately attempting to conceal the beginnings of an erection.

"The fuck are you fidgeting about?"

Deflecting, you turn your body away and look into the side view mirror of your car — your hair is sticking up in awkward places and you make a show of running your fingers through it to try to fix it, hoping he'll think that's what you're freaking out about, but he brusquely bats your hand away.

You furtively steal a glance down at your junk to assess the damages — it's not that bad, you're wearing briefs and it's not that hard so you don't think he'd notice unless he was actually looking for it. You allow yourself to relax and focus on how fucked your hair is.

"I look like shit," you protest.

"That's _the fuckin' point._ "

"Dude, I can't go out in _public_ looking like this, what if the papar —"

Dirk groans dramatically before shoving his own hat onto your head. "There, now no one can see your shitty hair."

You can see why he wears the hat now; he's kind of got a receding hairline, but you guess it's not bad for forty-five. He attempts to remedy his hat hair by haphazardly running his fingers through it, but that only succeeds in making him look even more absurd than before. He doesn't seem to give any kind of shit, though.

He notices your tie still thrown over his shoulder, so he grabs it off and ties it around his own collar. You're surprised he knows how to tie a tie at all, let alone a full Windsor, but he does, and you bust out laughing the moment he finishes.

"Dude, you look fucking ridiculous." And he does. He's got it tied up real high, so his collar is just stuck up around his neck. 

"Good," he succinctly proclaims, before gesturing towards the diner. "Now let's go."

You hesitate. Honestly, you're kind of nervous. Will a hat and a rucked up shirt really stop anyone from recognizing you?

"Don't worry, babe, I'll protect you," he drawls, and despite how scathingly dry and mocking his tone is, your face kind of goes red anyway. _Christ_ what is wrong with you?

With a roll of his eyes, Dirk turns and starts to make his way to the building. You remember to lock your car and then awkwardly hurry after him.

By the time the two of you walk through the doors, your boner has at least gone down, but the anxiety that's replaced it is twice as bad. You nervously glance around the diner, nearly jumping when the hostess looks over to you and smiles.

"Calm down, you fucking spaz," Dirk hisses as the hostess comes around to seat you.

"Two?" she asks, seemingly completely unperturbed by either of your ridiculous appearances. Despite your nerves, she didn't betray an ounce of recognition when her eyes passed over you.

Dirk nods. "Yeah."

She takes you over to a booth by the window and leaves you with the menus, but you need to take a moment to survey the rest of the diner to see if anyone else might have noticed you.

"I told you, dude," Dirk laughs. "Not one of these people give a _fuck_ about you. You ain't a person to them, you're a picture on the cover of a magazine — take away your image and you're nobody."

You're not sure whether that's a relief or a disappointment. Jesus, are you really that much of an attention whore?

Guilty, but at least more assured of your inconspicuity than you were before, you pick up your menu and hide behind it. Looking through the options, nothing jumps out at you as sounding particularly appetizing.

"I don't think I've ever been to this place before."

Dirk snorts derisively. "Course you haven't."

You let your menu fall back onto the table and huff. "It's not like I was fucking born rich and famous, dude."

That just makes him laugh uproariously, mockingly strained and fake. You shrink back into your seat and glance around the diner nervously, but it doesn't seem like anybody gives a shit about the noise.

"Yeah, you weren't _born_ that way, but your mother was hardly a fuckin' street beggar, kid."

"I just — I just meant — oh, _fuck you,_ " you spit, before picking up your menu again. Your face is burning and you want to punch him in the neck and why the fuck did you even _come_ here? You _knew_ this would be a terrible fucking idea, he's an asshole and a jerk and you don't want to eat this shitty food _anyway_ and — your table's waitress comes around to interrupt your internal hissy fit.

"What can I get for you boys?" the waitress asks, smiling warmly at you.

"I want a bacon cheddar with tap," Dirk answers quickly. He turns to look at you when he's done. "What you want?"

You haven't actually been _reading_ the menu all this time. Put on the spot, you hastily skim the menu for something to pick, but you end up not retaining a fucking thing you read. "Um —"

"If you need some time to decide, honey, I can wait."

"No, um — I guess — " You just pick the first thing your eyes fall on on the lunch menu. "A club sandwich? And apple juice?" you say, looking up at the waitress.

"Can do. Anything else?"

"Nope," Dirk replies, and the waitress leaves you on your own.

Mortified, you lean your forehead against your palm with your elbow up on the table.

"The fuck you moping about?"

You look up at him and sigh. "You're _humiliating_ me."

"Yeah, isn't fun, is it," he says dryly, smirking at you with disdain.

You try to groan, but it comes out more like a whine. "I wanna go home."

Dirk sneers at you like you'd just shit your pants. "Oh man up, you fuckin' child."

"The hell did you even make me come out here if you were just going to take the piss out of me?"

"Taking the piss out of you wasn't my _plan_. My _plan_ was to come here and hang out and maybe have somethin' resembling fun, but then _you_ ruined it by being a stuck up fourteen year old boy who can't handle havin' his little fantasy bubble popped."

You're getting kind of upset. Jesus, why do you even care so much about what he thinks? He's done nothing but repeatedly affirm that he's a complete fucking dick, but for some reason what he says actually matters to you. "But if you hate me so much then why —"

"I don't _hate_ you, you imbecile," he sighs, exasperated. "I told you I like you."

"But you're — you don't — you don't say this shit to people you _like_."

"Says who? The fact I said this shit while liking you seems to poke some holes in your theory, broseph."

"I have no idea how to deal with you."

You're interrupted when the waitress comes back around with your food. That was quick. "Here you go," she says, putting out the plates before you. "Let me know if you need anything else, all right?"

"Yeah," Dirk says, wasting no time to begin to eat.

Your sandwich isn't bad. It's no fine dining, but you can't really complain. The apple juice has a strange after-taste, though, but given that you're sure he'd shit all over you if you mentioned it, you don't say anything about it.

You're too scared to say anything at all, in fact, so you just kind of awkwardly sit there until both of you have finished your food and you're left dodgily searching for anything to look at that isn't him.

"You're just... not what I expected, is all," Dirk eventually says after a long period of silence. You're a bit startled when he speaks, even.

"What, did you actually think I act like I do in interviews in real life?" you ask, making an attempt to bring some levity into your tone. You're not sure it's working.

Dirk shrugs. "I 'unno. Not really. Just think you'd be like this, specifically." He pauses to ask a passing waitress for a check. "I thought you'd be... more like me."

You can't help but laugh at that. "Dude, you're a fucking _freak._ I don't think there's anyone in the _world_ like you."

He gives you this _look_ you can't parse, but before you can pry any further, the waitress comes around with the check. When he reaches for his wallet, you consider offering to pay, but think better of it. He leaves a 20 on the table and moves to stand, looking to you as he does.

"You wanna go see The Room? There's a showing in a couple hours."

"God yes."

 

***

 

You drive around for a few hours to kill time; he gets you going on about some behind-the-scenes SBaHJ shit, which is at least a subject you're comfortable talking about. When you make it to the theater you're actually a bit late, but you've seen The Room so many times it doesn't really matter.

"Anybody got a football?" Dirk loudly asks as you come up the ramp into the main body of the theater. Your immediate reaction is to flinch in embarrassment — what kind of asshole shouts in a theater? — but are surprised to discover that instead of receiving angry protests to quiet down, a a very short guy wearing a wig and a full tuxedo stands up from his seat in the middle aisles.

"Heads up!" he shouts, and summarily lobs a football at Dirk.

Dirk makes a flawless catch, and just as quickly tosses it back. The boy enthusiastically catches it and the two engage in a vigorous match of toss-the-football, the short dude climbing over the seats whenever Dirk deliberately sends the ball just out of his stationary reach. You just watch and laugh with amusement. 

"All right, boys, I think that's enough," a girl seated in the aisle with a small group of other people laughs. Dirk smirks and sends the football her way, and she doesn't flinch to catch it. She returns a dark grin of her own, motioning come-hither with her free hand. "Come sit with us." It's almost funny how hard she's trying to make her voice sound sultry and sexy — with a few years' more practice, it might even work. 

It looks like that apart from the two of you, this other group are the only other people in the theater. Besides the black-haired girl, there are five other boys with her; four of them are clad in tuxedos with long, greasy black wigs. Of those four, only one of them — the shortest one, and the one who'd lobbed the football to Dirk when you came in — looks like he's actually here of his own volition. One of the boys has an expression like he's being forced to suck a lemon at gunpoint, and the other two exude an air of quiet suffering. They all look to be in their late teens, apart from one of the tuxedo-clad boys who is extraordinarily tall and robust, but you can't tell if he's actually older or just unusually developed for his age.

And then there's the... juggalo. Or that's what you assume he is, given the ridiculous facepaint and decidedly hideous wardrobe.

You don't think he actually came in there with the other group. Even from a distance you can tell he's stoned out of his fucking gourd (and upon this revelation, you also begin to realize that the theater sinks of weed). He looks like he's got at least ten years on the rest of the kids, and you can guess why they've clustered around him.

You look up at the screen; Tommy Wiseau is currently gyrating his hips into Juliette Danielle's stomach as nauseating music plays over the scene. You and Dirk make your way over to take your seats, a row up behind the rest of the group.

"Yo, motherfuckers, wanna hit?" the juggalo inquires, raising into your view a ludicrously colorful bong. How the fuck did he get that into the theater?

Dirk immediately declines as he settles into his seat. "Nah."

"Shit, dude, you're gonna get caught with that thing," you say, eying the bong warily as the juggalo continues to leave it hoisted into plain view of anyone who happened to walk in. You sit down right behind the black-haired girl.

The juggalo smiles at you with his bloodshot half-lidded eyes, looking like just about the most contended guy in the universe. "Nah, man. S'cool, s'chill. I do this _all_ the time."

... Well, why the fuck not? You've got your medical marijuana card on you anyway. You shrug and take the proffered bong and baggie of weed; Dirk looks at you like you're fucking nuts, but doesn't say anything. The black-haired woman offers you her lighter, which you use to quickly light the bowl.

"You know, you sound familiar," the black-haired girl purrs, turned around in her seat with her chin set in her arms folded over the rest. You immediately start to choke and sputter mid-hit, but thankfully — or not so thankfully — she doesn't actually pursue the issue. Instead, she gives a glance to Dirk before asking an even more disarming question. "He your boyfriend?"

"Uh, no," you laugh uncomfortably, lighting up again so you can hide behind the bong. This time you actually manage a decent hit.

"He's my brother," Dirk supplies. You throw him an appreciative glance as you pass the bong and bag back to the juggalo, and the lighter back to the girl; you don't want to get that baked around these guys anyway, so you just leave it at the one bowl.

"Oh. Does that mean you're single?" the girl asks, batting her eyelashes seductively. Her eyes are so bloodshot the effect is ridiculous. 

"You're like fourteen," you laugh. Shit, how are you already getting the giggles? You weren't expecting it to actually be quality weed.

She raises her head from her arms and narrows her eyes. "I'm seventeen," she protests; when you only laugh harder, she huffs and turns back around to face the screen. She reminds you of Meenah. You decide you hate her.

It doesn't take long for the weed to kick in at all. That shit was fucking _dank_ , way more potent than the shit you smoke at home. Within ten minutes the world is fucking beautiful and Tommy Wiseau is a magnificent God communing directly with you from the heavens. You resolve to ask the juggalo to hook you up with his dealer later.

You all (that is, those of you actually willing to be here; the three unhappily be-wigged boys remain conspicuously silent and surly throughout.) shout at the screen every time framed cutlery comes onto the scene. You're so fucking baked you're practically writhing in your seat, laughing at _every_ thing Tommy Wiseau says, yelling out the lines as they're spoken because you have this whole fucking masterpiece of a film memorized to the word. Dirk isn't exactly sharing in the ludicrous degree of your hysterics, but he grins broadly through the entire Denny drug scene and gets up every time the characters start inexplicably tossing around the football on screen.

Having written you off as a no-go, the black hair girl turned her attentions towards Dirk. When one of the other unreasonably long sex scenes rolls around, she turns around in her seat again, this time focused on Dirk. (Every time she turns around you catch the surliest looking tuxedo wearing guy glaring bloody fucking murder at the both of you.)

"Nice tie."

"Thanks," Dirk replies, not sounding very thankful at all.

"What's your name, sweetheart?" she asks him. 

Dirk looks her up and down with a deliberately critical expression. You barely manage to contain your sniggering as you watch the exchange. "You got a dick?" Dirk asks her.

"What? No!" she sputters, drawing back with clear offense. The angry tuxedoed boy snickers disdainfully, but she doesn't seem to realize he's laughing at her. "What are you implying?"

"Not interested unless you've got a dick, is what I'm implying," Dirk drawls, leaning casually back in his seat as he eyes her condescendingly.

"... Oh," she says, once the realization has dawned on her. She awkwardly looks between the two of you for a moment before she turns back around, sits down and doesn't bother you for the rest of the movie.

You, however, are significantly more hung up on the revelation. That removes a pretty big uncertainty from the equation — that is, assuming it wasn't just a joke to get the girl off his back. It was pretty obvious that he's into you to begin with, given the fact he is patently obsessed with you, but you weren't entirely sure if an actual sexual dimension was there. You might actually have a chance.

As soon as the thought crosses your mind you're weirded out by the absurdity of the fact you're hoping to have "a chance" with _your stalker_.

As the movie draws to a close and everyone is getting up to leave, you pull the juggalo aside. Dirk gives you the nastiest look you've ever seen as he hangs back to wait for you, but you ignore him.

"Hey man," you looking around shiftily. "That was some good shit. You wanna hook me up with your dealer?"

The juggalo grins a grin that gives him the look of someone severely brain damaged. His breath somehow manages to overpower his marijuana stank and you struggle to not recoil in disgust when he speaks. "Shit, my motherbrother, you're looking right the fuck at him."

"Can I get your number?" you ask, pulling out your phone.

"Heeellll yeah."

 

***

 

By the time the two of you exit the theater and begin the walk back to the car, you've just about worn out your high. You're kinda hungry but you don't bother to complain.

You break the silence with a question you immediately regret. "Were you serious about — about, uh, the gay thing?"

"Yeah, why?" he says, glancing back to you as he walks. "You got a problem with me being a fag?"

"What, no — I — just curious," you answer quickly, internally kicking yourself. He shrugs and keeps walking. Without thinking, you hastily add, "I was pretty sure you were anyway."

Dirk looks back at you again with a raised brow, and your breath catches in your throat as you anticipate his response. He'll ask you why you thought that and you'll tell him it seems like he likes you and then he'll have to confirm or deny it and then —

But he doesn't do any of that, and just turns back around to complete the journey back to the car instead.

 _Jesus, just ask him if he likes you, you fucking pussy, it's not like there's any chance this guy doesn't want your dick, holy shit_ —

You don't ask him if he likes you. You just climb into the passenger seat and awkwardly steal glances at him out of the corner of your eye as he drives.

You'd agreed to let him drive you to the theater, but not without a fight. He'd suggested that you just leave your car in the parking lot of Denny's, to which you protested because it's a fucking Mercedes-Benz what if someone _steals_ it, but he told you that it'd be a much bigger deal if his car got stolen because he doesn't have "eight other fucking useless piece of shit foreign cars", made him really mad when you told him no one would want to steal his awful beat up car anyway, and when you'd suggested that you take both of them he just laughed at you until your embarrassment overrode your fear of getting shanked and you gave in.

"Have you met Tommy Wiseau?" he eventually asks some time through the ride. He has a manner of driving that unnerves you; he uses one hand on the wheel and is otherwise completely fucking still, doesn't turn his head to check the mirrors or react to anything. His shades obscure his eyes in such a way that you can't tell if he's even actually paying attention to the road.

"Yeah, a couple of times. He's as amazing in person as you'd expect. I've been trying to get him on board with SBaHJ for a while but I don't wanna waste him, I'm waiting for the right role."

"Cool," Dirk evenly says. He's pulling into the parking lot of the Denny's now.

"You want me to introduce you?"

He doesn't react until he's pulled into a space, and even when he turns to look at you his expression seems strained. Is he reluctant to take advantage of what he perceives as your undeserved privileges? You know he hates your money, but you question if his scorn extends to your connections as well. His jaw is set hard and he seems to have to think about it for a while until he answers. "Can you get him to act in Detective Pony?"

His complete evasion of the matter clues you in to the fact he's probably conflicted about it, but you don't chase the issue. "Yeah. Probably. What would he even play, though?"

"I dunno," Dirk says with a shrug. "Anna's dad, maybe."

"Hell, we could just cast him as Anna."

Dirk cracks a smirk at that. "Heh, nah. Too silly."

Your laugh transitions into an awkward silence. You eventually realize that you're just kind of sitting there in his car. "I should probably go," you say.

"Yeah. Walk you to your car."

"Assuming it's still there," you gripe. He rolls his eyes at you but opens the door and steps out anyway; you follow shortly after once you've collected your jacket and shades from where you'd left them in his back seat.

Sure enough, your car is still there. As you walk over you begin the effort of recomposing your image; you rebutton and retuck your shirt, put on your shades, and slip your jacket back on over your shoulders. You realize what you're forgetting once you both come to a stop in front of your car; you give a crooked grin and reach out to work your tie off from around his neck, and he pulls his hat off yours to set back on his own head.

You look up at Dirk; you're not _short,_ but he's still quite a bit taller than you, and it's moments like these where he really seems to tower over you. You search for something to say and come up empty-handed. 

If Dirk were a girl, this is probably the point where you'd be laying on the smooth moves. But he's not a girl, and you have fucking idea what you're doing, so you just kind of stand there awkwardly and stare at him? _Good fucking going, dude, you're a regular fucking Casanova._

"Well, bye," Dirk eventually says.

"Bye," you echo.

You can't decide whether your inaction is smart or idiotic, but you have no compunctions about staring at his ass as he leaves.


	5. Chapter 5

_This is becoming alarmingly routine,_ you note, as you find yourself lain out in front of a screen of puppet porn with your fingers up your ass.

Sometimes you look back and just laugh to think about how much simpler things were before him.

At first you'd gotten by just whacking it to the same half-dozen clips you found strewn across a various selection of streaming porn sites, but eventually it became clear that that wasn't enough. You ended up torrenting every movie of Dirk's you could find, scouring every one for scenes in which his sausage appears — of which, you discovered, there are distressingly few. The great majority of his body of work is exclusively puppet on puppet material, but every once in a while you'll come across a film he personally appears in. It's never more than his dick and the stray glimpse of a hand or limb; at this point you're pretty sure you'd actually _pay_ for something that'd show his body, embarrassing paper trail be damned.

So pretty much every night you've been choking the chicken to some video of him stuffing the butt of a freakish looking smut puppet. And what you do in the bedroom started to bleed out into your day to day life — as of late you've been perpetually plagued by increasingly elaborate sexual fantasies, all of them centering around Dirk and his huge dick. It leaves you horny _all the fucking time,_ like some 13 year old boy who just discovered what jacking off was, and it's becoming legitimately distracting. It's not such a big deal now that you're in a moment of downtime, but the date of the first shoot of the next SBaHJ movie is looming ever closer and you don't know what the fuck you'll do if you can't direct because your penis won't behave.

You've started talking to him on Pesterchum a lot, which is rapidly becoming even more distracting than the sexual fantasies themselves (of which your conversations are also often the genesis of). Every time he messages you you have to drop everything you're doing to hang off his every fucking word, with butterflies in your stomach that don't go away for hours after you've stopped talking — you have to roll around on the fucking couch just _agonizing_ over every little word he's said to you, searching in equal parts for evidence that he wants you and evidence that you should shut down this ridiculous infatuation once and for all, but you can neither will yourself to take initiative nor rid yourself of the obsession.

You think about what sex with him would be like a lot. At first you thought about sucking him off, mostly, and him sucking you off, and how it would feel to kiss him and touch him and feel the heat of his body against you. Sometimes you'd think about fucking him, but he never really seemed like the kind of guy who would let you. He'd probably want to fuck _you,_ which you weren't sure about; you've never actually let a guy fuck you before (or maybe you have and don't remember it — you spent more of college drunk than not, you honestly wouldn't be surprised), but given Dirk's disposition, you figure that's how it would go. The more you dwelt on it, and the more time you spent watching his videos with your hands down your pants, the more... amenable to the concept you became. Desperate's probably more accurate.

You began to experiment. You'd had some lube left over from when you actually had some semblance of a healthy romantic life, but couldn't bring yourself to buy an actual dildo, so you just decided to use your fingers. It was surprisingly difficult for you to overcome your weird masculinity issues and just stick something up your ass, but once you beat that hurdle you started to do it just about every night.

Of which tonight is no exception. With your laptop open on your bed, you've settled before it in your underwear and an old tee. Your cock is already half hard in anticipation as you watch the video on the screen; the hand-held camera is pointed down at a bulbously berumped puppet lain prone by the edge of the bed, its backside jutting impudently up at the lens. Dirk talks dirty to the puppet with the most ridiculous porn star dialogue you've ever heard, informing it that he's about to "stir its guts" with his "monster cock" and that he hopes its "wet puppet pussy" can handle "so many long hard inches of beef". You'd laugh if you weren't so ashamed to be actually getting off on this shit. 

Your hand runs its way up your stomach until you've pushed your shirt up to your armpits, absently pinching and rubbing over your nipples. You watch Dirk fishing his dick from his jeans as you move your other hand south to palm over the burgeoning erection in your briefs. You squeeze yourself gently and release a quiet sigh before shifting to push your fingers beneath your waistband, lifting your hips up into the touch of your hand around your swelling flesh.

The puppet looks so small next to his cock; it seems hard to imagine how that thing could possibly manage to squeeze into such a tiny toy. You've seen this before, though, and you remember very well how it goes.

As Dirk is slicking his cock with lube on the screen, you withdraw your hand and shift around to open the drawer to your bedside table where you stash your own. You set the tube beside yourself before you hook your thumbs in the waistband of your briefs and push them down and off your legs.

Now bare apart from your hiked up shirt, you recline back and return your attention to your laptop screen. Your cock throbs as you watch Dirk slowly jack himself to full size; transfixed, you pick up your lube and squeeze a liberal amount out onto your fingers.

You reach your hand down around your lifted leg and press your fingers against yourself, encircling your hole in a lazy rhythm, slowly palming along the underside of your hard cock with your other hand. As he pushes into the puppet's felt ass, straining the inner lining to a point where it's miraculous it doesn't break, you think about how it would feel to have him inside of you. You bite your lip as you slip your middle finger inside; the sensation is always so strange at first, but as you shift around, probing around your inner walls, you're quick to acclimate.

You slowly work your finger in and out as Dirk settles to the hilt inside the now decidedly distended puppet on the screen; he always anthropomorphizes them so thoroughly, pretends like they're real and fucks them like they're real. He murmurs reassurances to the puppet as he waits, still, as if giving it time to adjust — and when he so very slowly begins to pull back, gently gripping the puppet around the midsection, you press a second finger inside.

You're always really tense when you do it, and even two fingers causes you some discomforting strain. You can't even imagine how he'd manage to fit inside you, or how _anyone_ could; you're not sure if you're doing something wrong or just direly want for practice, but you settle for assuming it's the latter and keep jamming things up your butt anyway.

He's started to move inside the puppet now, still at an agonizing pace, and you mimic the motions of his hips with your fingers; you push in as he pushes in, pull out as he pulls out. Your breath hitches in your throat each time you sink in to the knuckles and it leaves your body in a gust each time you hook your fingers up and pull out, dragging the tips against your prostate. Precum leaks onto your bare stomach, and you encircle your cock around the base with your free hand. You drag your fist up as your fingers push in, run your thumb along the slit and smear the fluid all around the head and then drag it back down again, leaving slick trails in your hand's wake.

Dirk's rhythm starts to pick up; every time he strikes deep within the puppet it _squeaks,_ which you find kind of absurd, but you focus on the sounds of his faint shallow breath and the wet movements of his cock inside the lubricated core. You lick your lips and squeeze more tightly around your cock, drive your fingers inside yourself a little more forcefully, and then you add a third finger inside and it _hurts_ but at this point you really couldn't care. You rock your hips up into your own movements, which have taken on a faster, rougher pace in time with the video on the screen; you feel stretched and raw and so very _filled,_ and your eyes slip shut and you just imagine it's _him,_ that he's between your thighs with his rough hand around your cock that he jerks out of time with the deep hard thrusts of his hips because he wants you so bad, as much as you want and need and crave for him every fucking waking hour.

He's selfish and rough and just takes what he wants, and the discomfort _is_ the pleasure as you think of him above you and pressed against you, teeth biting at your lips, fingers bruising your hips, slamming into your body so quickly the sensations become a blur; a ragged moan escapes your parted lips as you fuck yourself, desperately rocking up into your fingers because no matter how deep you get it doesn't feel _enough_.

You rapidly approach climax as you stroke your cock in time with the rough strikes of your fingers against your prostate — but at the last fucking moment you pull your hand away and deprive yourself to make it last. Your eyes shoot open and you pant heavily as you come to a stop, spasming around the stilled fingers inside you. Your cock aches for release and it takes all your willpower not to touch yourself, but you fist your free hand in the sheets as you back away from the edge. 

Your gaze flits back up to the screen; Dirk has shifted positions to sit on the edge of the bed, slowly jacking himself off with the puppet. You continue to push your fingers in and out, at a much slower pace, experimentally flexing your muscles around them. You're still too close to touch your cock so you run your hand up your body, over your taut stomach and nipples and then to your lips, and when you slip your fingers inside you can taste yourself. As you hungrily lick the pre from your fingers and palm you imagine it's how he would taste, and when there's nothing left you suck them back into your mouth, sucking and massaging at the pads of your digits with your tongue.

God, you want to suck him off so fucking bad. You work your fingers in and out of yourself from both ends, eyes half-lidded as you stare at Dirk's dick on the screen. It's so — it's so fucking _thick,_ and sometimes he'll slide the puppet all the way up and you'll catch a glimpse of the wet glistening head of his cock, and you want to run your tongue against the glans and along the folds and over the pulsating veins and feel him fill your mouth and fuck your throat; you push into your mouth as far as you can go without making yourself gag, pretend as hard as you can that it's him and do your best to settle when it's not.

You're so fucking horny you're fucking writhing and moaning around your own fingers. You start to press up against your prostate again, sending jolts of pleasure to your neglected cock. You've eased off well enough, so you withdraw from your mouth and shift your arm down to take yourself into your hand again; you want something back in your mouth but you only have two hands, so you resort to biting and sucking at your own lower lip instead.

You return to a steady rhythm, pumping your cock and pounding into your ass in time with Dirk's motions in the video. He shifts again, back just a little, and although the glimpse of his clothed thighs is barely much of anything it drives you fucking crazy. You tighten your grip and roughen your fingers' thrust, not fast but hard, and it grows increasingly difficult to stifle the whimpers your movements elicit. 

You're nearing the edge once again, and you know that Dirk is just about as well; you consider backing off again but you're just too fucking desperate to come to do it, so you just get ready to push yourself over. Dirk's motions grow more erratic, his breath heavier and just a bit louder, and just those little sounds are fucking intoxicating to you. You wish you could hear him with his mouth besides your ear, breath hot on your skin — you become rapped up in the fantasy again, of his lips and hands and his cock inside you, keening as you jack yourself and fuck yourself as you imagine he would until you're spilling yourself all over your stomach and chest in a powerful orgasm that leaves you gasping for breath.

You open your eyes and exhale heavily once you've managed to calm, withdrawing your fingers. The movie just moved to a new scene; you consider turning it off but a quick assessment of your hands suggests that touching your laptop would be a bad idea. Instead, you reach over for the box of tissues on your bedside table and clean yourself up, then click off the video with an appropriately layered gunk barrier. After you drag yourself out of bed, you pull off your dirty shirt to throw in the laundry basket and shamble into the bathroom for a long shower.

When you finish and make your way back into your bedroom, you notice a new Pesterchum window with decidedly orange text open on your screen and your heart skips a beat. Without bothering to get dressed, you hop back onto your bed and hastily reply.

timaeusTestified [TT] began pestering turntechGodhead [TG]

TT: Hey.   
TG: hey sorry i was in the shower  
TG: whats up   
TT: I was just thinking.   
TG: bout what   
TT: There's something I've been meaning to tell you.   
TG: yeah?   
TT: Yeah.   
TG: well  
TG: what is it   
TT: Would probably be best if I say it in person.   
TG: alright  
TG: when you wanna go out again   
TT: It's sort of private.   
TG: uh  
TG: what does that mean   
TT: That I'd like to tell you about it, in private.   
TG: no shit asshole   
TT: I was thinking I could come over to your place.

You freeze, fingers hovering over the keys. Oh _Jesus_ , this is actually fucking it. There's no way that wasn't a pass. Your mind overloads from the dissonance between your idiotic libido and your desire to not be dead, and you struggle to find an appropriate response. Eventually, Dirk reads into your silence on his own and messages you again.

TT: Unless you still don't trust me.   
TG: shit  
TG: dude i dunno  
TG: look its not like i dont want to  
TG: but youre still kinda   
TT: Creepy.   
TG: yeah that  
TG: no offense   
TT: Kinda some taken.   
TG: ok you pretty much arent allowed to be offended by that on account of 100% being a creeper   
TT: If you say so.   
TG: luckily for you im fucking reckless and a moron  
TG: so yeah  
TG: you can come up  
TG: when do you wanna do it   
TT: 5 PM tomorrow work?   
TG: yeah ok

You just outright give him your address. You figure he probably already knew what it was, but it makes you feel better about it all to pretend that he didn't so that's what you do.

As soon as you've said your goodbyes and closed out of Pesterchum, you realize what a colossally fucking stupid thing you just did.

You lay on your bed, staring up at the ceiling as your nerves refuse to let your heartbeat slow. You probably just invited him to fucking kill you, or take you hostage, or at the very least rob you. You know you should back out but you don't fucking _want_ to. You're an idiot and a moron and so very, very horny.

You roll over and grab your phone off your bedside table where you'd left it. Worrying your lip with your teeth, you scroll through your list of contacts and pull up Aradia's number. You dial her and curse under your breath as you wait for her to pick up.

She doesn't take long. "Hello."

"Hey Aradia," you say, trying to keep the tremor from your voice.

"Yes?"

You fall back onto your bed, receiver by your ear, and release a sigh. "Can you do me a favor?"

"Yes."

"Okay, I'm about to do something really stupid."

She doesn't answer, just waits for you to clarify. You take a deep breath.

"I'm pretty sure Dirk just asked me to fuck and I agreed that I would, and he's coming over here, but I know it's a really bad idea so I want you to call me at 5:15 PM tomorrow and if I don't pick up or I tell you I need help just call the cops or something."

There's a long pause before Aradia replies. A dreadful anxiety wells in your stomach through her silence; you never actually told her you like men, and however irrational you know it to be, there's some little niggling voice in the back of your head that makes you worry what she'll think of you. In the end she doesn't even address it, though — she hones in on a much more salient flaw.

"Dave, that is stupid."

"I know. But I need to do it anyway or I'm going to go fucking insane. Just help me out."

"All right," she answers. You're about to thank her and hang up before she raises another concern. "What if he intimidates you into telling me not to call for assistance?"

You hadn't thought of that. "I dunno. I'll drop some kind of code word or something. 'Festering ass'."

"It would probably be more practical to use a word or phrase that you could convincingly pass off as a natural part of a brief conversation."

"If you honestly think I can't find a way to naturally work 'festering ass' into _any_ conversation you don't know me at all."

Aradia ever-so-slightly sighs and you grin, even though nobody can see you. "Should that plan fail, try 'Thursday'."

"Yeah, all right," you say, sitting up. You flip back open your laptop. "Thanks."

"Goodnight, Dave," Aradia replies, and hangs up.

You set your phone back aside and pull up Pesterchum. You're not even going to try to sleep at this point; you're sure you're going to be up pissing your pants until you're so exhausted you physically cannot even think anymore, so you figure you'll kill some time by bothering Rose.

turntechGodhead [TG] began pestering tentacleTherapist [TT]

TG: sis  
TG: are you still up   
TT: Yes.   
TG: you were right   
TT: Dave, as much as you know I love to hear those words from you, it typically helps when I know what exactly it is that I'm right about.   
TG: im pretty sure im going to get laid   
TT: ... Congratulations?   
TG: by my stalker  
TG: thats not a grats thing  
TG: thats a dave youre crazy thing   
TT: Dave, you're crazy.   
TG: no shit  
TG: but yeah my assessment was pretty much on the mark  
TG: 7-8 easy  
TG: ass is a 10  
TG: id marry that ass   
TT: What a great reason to put your safety at risk.   
TG: i dunno  
TG: hes weird but i like him  
TG: he does some mega creepy shit but i think he PROBABLY doesnt want to actually murder me or whatever  
TG: worst i can see him wanting is to fuck me  
TG: which  
TG: im pretty much down for  
TG: actually im kind of extremely down for it  
TG: so whatever   
TT: I hope you know what you're doing.   
TG: haha i dont at all  
TG: i got aradia to back me up though so i should be ok   
TT: So, how do you plan to deal with all that gay media attention you fear so much when this inevitably gets out?   
TG: its not like i want to date the guy  
TG: hes definitely uh  
TG: interesting  
TG: but i dont think i could handle his shit all of the time   
TT: Given that he's gone as far as he has to get to you, I find it hard to imagine him being satisfied being your friend with benefits.    
TG: rose i just want to get laid  
TG: why do you have to make it so complicated   
TT: It's your life.  
TT: You're free to make all the terrible choices you wish.   
TG: thanks for the vote of confidence sis   
TT: Oh, dear brother, if there is _anything_ in this world in which I am confident, it is your ability to do stupid fucking things.   
TG: you are easily the worst sister ever   
TT: We deserve each other.   
TG: real inspiring   
TT: It certainly is.  
TT: And while this is all very touching, I should be off to bed.   
TG: do you have to   
TT: Yes, Dave, I have to.   
TG: come on  
TG: im not gonna be able to sleep until im ready to pass out  
TG: entertain me rose   
TT: No.   
TG: please   
TT: No.   
TG: please

tentacleTherapist [TT] ceased pestering turntechGodhead [TG]

TG: bitch

turntechGodhead [TG] ceased pestering tentacleTherapist [TT]

With a sigh, you shut your laptop off, move it off onto your bedside table and flop down onto your bed. You close your eyes and try to sleep, but just as you expected, the fucking circus is in full swing and you can't even begin to relax. So you _think_.

You consider the pros and cons of fucking this guy.

You like him. You really do. He's a fucking asshole, but there's a strange (and probably very unhealthy) attraction in that to you; every ounce of approval or affection he allows seems so rarefied. You can't pretend it doesn't hurt when he rips on you, but the few times he begrudges a kind word give you a high that you don't think anyone ever has before; kindness from him means more just _because_ of how freely cruel he's willing to be. You feel like you actually did something to _earn_ it, that he wouldn't say it to just anyone, and it feels so much more genuine stripped of that platitudinous pretense. His affection is so scarce and so _conditional,_ and it makes you feel... special.

And his crass demeanor is something of a novelty — there aren't very many people who are willing to straight up give you shit to begin with. Given that you are a person of significant influence, even people you'd consider your closest friends are wary of the tumultuous world of celebrity politics; the only people ever really willing to be honestly candid with you are your siblings and... Eridan.

So you honestly find it a bit refreshing, the way he is so utterly unafraid of you. The fate of his career as a writer essentially rests in your hands, but he doesn't pull punches or grovel or kiss your ass. He just treats you like you've known each other for years, and sometimes you find yourself forgetting you haven't.

He's also so very, very creepy.

You didn't think the puppet porn was all that weird, and you were pretty amused by his SBaHJ parodies, but you made the mistake of digging. You checked out who plushrump.com was registered to; it was under someone else's name, or a fake name (though you'd imagine he would have gotten caught already if it was fake). When you did a search for that name, you found some other... interesting results.

He maintains a blog that aggregates pretty much all of the news related to you on the internet. It contains none of his own commentary, but it's... exhaustingly comprehensive. Probably run by a bot, even. When you were done feeling kind of weird you actually bookmarked it as a resource for those masochistic excursions you like to take into the gossipy depths of the Hell.

Much stranger yet, he also owns a domain called "lalondeslips.com", which, as you discovered, is essentially a shrine to... pictures of your lips. Hundreds and hundreds and hundreds of high resolution photographs cropped around your lips, and only your lips. You were initially more confused than creeped out when you found it. (There were also much, much smaller sections devoted to pictures of your mother and your sister. There was one really unfortunate photo where it kinda looked like Rose had a mustache because of the lighting so you sent it to her and made fun of her for days.)

You... wouldn't be surprised if he murders people and hides their corpses in his basement. He is by all accounts functionally your stalker. You honestly don't really know anything at all about him and you doubt he'd tell you if you asked; the porn and the weird websites and the persistent pursuit are probably only the tip of the iceberg and it kind of frightens you to imagine how deep it really goes.

But _Jesus_ his ass is nice.

 

***

 

You wake up the next morning and aren't freaking out about it any less than you were the night before. The effect is compounded by the fact it's not actually the morning, it's 2:16 PM, and you have less than three hours before you're either fucked or murdered.

You brush your teeth and shower and clean yourself very, _very_ thoroughly. You fuss over your hair and what you'll wear (you settle for the poorest looking clothes in your closet, which are a red t-shirt and some old skinny jeans that at least flatter your ass), and you actually put on fucking mascara because you have blond eyelashes and you look like a ghost if you don't. And then you take it off because you're sure he'd call you a fag for wearing it. You spend the rest of the remaining time trying to decide whether it'd be weird if you wore your shades.

When you hear a knock at your door you realize just how utterly unprepared for this you really are.

You hurry over to the front door and pull it open after you've taken a deep steadying breath. It doesn't really do much good, though, since you still just about piss yourself when you see Dirk stood before you.

"Hey," you greet him. You're trying your very best to keep your tone even and your expression blank, but without your shades you're sure you're not doing very well. You're really not all that good at it without them, and his own flawless stoicism only exacerbates your nerves. You should have just worn them, you wear them in all of your public appearances anyway, he probably wouldn't have thought anything of it if you just kept them on and —

He interrupts your fretting with his reply. "Sup," he says, betraying no anxiety of his own. Why is he so much better at being you than you are?

You just kinda stare for a few moments before you remember to invite him in. When you close the door behind him, you're at least relieved that he's yet to attack you; he just walks down the short hallway into the open main room of the apartment to look around. You follow him in and move off to stand at a comfortable distance, around the kitchen island. 

"Can I get you something to drink?" you ask, finding your mouth gone dry. He doesn't answer for a time, apparently lost in thought as he surveys your spacious apartment with his eyes. The plain manner in which you realize you've displayed your money makes you self conscious; you yourself look from your ludicrously large TV to your expensive leather couch to your granite kitchen countertops and imagine what he must think of you for it.

"Nah. I'm good."

You nervously watch him as you stand by the kitchen, drumming your fingers quietly against the island counter. You don't know what to say to him.

Eventually, he seems to have had his fill of looking around, and throws his gaze pensively over his shoulder. "You know, you never asked what my last name was," he says; you get the impression that there's more to that statement than just an innocent desire to share, but you can't read his carefully controlled expression.

"I guess I didn't," you reply, suspicious. "Why? What is it?" 

It wasn't until that moment that you really understood how much a single word could change everything.

"Strider."

Your stomach plummets like lead and your eyes blow wide and you suddenly feel very much like you need to sit down, but you're too stunned to move. "I... oh _God._ What?" you sputter, gaping at Dirk incredulously. "I — you're — are you seriously — _Bro?_ "

He just stares at you unblinkingly as you have a mental breakdown.

You see it. You see it and you don't know how you never saw it before. The hair, the way he acts, the _glasses_ — you don't even have to question that he is who he says he is, because it's plain as day and you're an utter fucking fool. He's taller now, his skin tanner, his voice deeper, but he's so very much your _brother_ that doubt doesn't cross your mind for even an instant.

"Fuck. Fuck," you mutter. "I haven't seen you since... _fuck,_ I was four? Five?"

"December 9th, 1983," he answers, a tight mockery of a smile disturbing his face. "Last time I saw you. Well, last time you saw _me,_ anyway."

Eventually, it's too much to stand. You shamble over to the dining table, pull out a chair and collapse into it. When you look back to him, your expression is as disarmed as you feel. "Why didn't — why didn't you _tell_ me?" you ask, brow furrowed deeply. Your initial shock is beginning to give way to indignation.

He shrugs noncommittally. "I thought you'd have figured it out by now. I mean, I don't think I was bein' particularly subtle to begin with. My first name wasn't any different."

"Fuck, dude, I don't know if I ever even _knew_ your name. You were always just Bro to me."

You stare at him, chest searing. He's your brother. The guy you have been gearing up to take to booty town is _your fucking brother._ The shock and the shame and the guilt and the rage coalesce into a confused miasma of emotion you can't make heads or tails of, beyond the fact you very much want it to stop, and the fact you know it won't. 

You were sure you had him figured out. You never really seriously doubted what his motivations were, even if your own insecurities paralyzed you from acting. It seemed fucking _obvious_ that he wanted you, you hadn't even _considered_ — but if he did, there was no reason for him to tell you who he was. If that's what he wanted, he could have just fucked you and never said a word — fuck, it's not like changing his name would have been much of an obstacle — but he _didn't_. He _didn't_ fuck you, and the longer you think back about it without coming up with _any_ examples where he'd outright displayed an overtly sexual interest beyond too-long glances and the errant smirk that could have easily been interpreted any way you wanted to, the less confident you become. Shit, had you been reading him wrong? Were you just projecting your own attraction onto him?

If he had asked just five minutes ago you _would_ have fucked him. Your _brother_. You feel like you're going to be sick.

As if Aradia had decided to wait for the worst possible time, your phone rings.

Cursing loudly, you fumble to dig your phone out of your pocket with shaking hands. Dirk watches you with a raised brow as you answer the call. "H-hello?" you exhale.

"You told me to call you now," Aradia announces from over the line.

"Yeah. Um. Yeah, everything's fine."

There's a pause before Aradia replies. "Are you sure?"

"No, no, it's okay," you say, but your still trembling voice probably isn't doing anything to assuage your assistant's concerns.

"... Do you remember Thursday?"

"Yeah, it's not that," you answer, casting a glance over to Dirk. "I'm all right. I just... I'm gonna go, okay? I'll talk to you later, bye."

You quickly hang up and set your phone down onto the dining table, staring at it without focus. "I think..." you look back up at Dirk, worrying your lip with your teeth. "Can you go? I just need to be... alone, right now."

Dirk thrusts his hands into his pants pockets, his expression carefully guarded. You're learning to infer more out of his periods of his greatest lack of emotion than from the actual configurations of his face. "Not happy to see me, lil bro?"

Your mouth opens and closes wordlessly before you finally bluster out a pained fracture of a reply. "I almost — you nearly — " You stop yourself and take a deep breath. "Please just leave. We can talk later. I just — not right now."

"Well, all right," he eventually answers. He lingers for a few long moments later before he shrugs and and ambles his way out the front door, leaving you to stew alone in your panic. You allow your forehead to fall onto the table and just leave it there.

Almost just as soon as the door clicks shut behind Dirk, Aradia lets herself into your apartment through the service elevator door.

"Dave," she says; you lift up your head once you realize she's there. "You sounded upset on the phone. I thought I should come check on you anyway."

"No, I'm okay," you answer, though you're sure the miserable look you're giving her isn't helping.

"What happened?"

"Nothing. I just — I heard something I wasn't expecting to hear. You don't have to — I'm fine."

You trust Aradia, but you can't talk about shit like this with her.

There's only one person you can.

 

***

 

turntechGodhead [TG] began pestering tentacleTherapist [TT]

TG: oh my fucking god  
TG: oh my fucking god   
TT: What.   
TG: hes my fucking brother rose  
TG: what the FUCK   
TT: ... What?   
TG: dirk  
TG: my stalker  
TG: my stalker who i was 3 fucking seconds from putting out for  
TG: is  
TG: my brother   
TT: Wow.  
TT: Your Bro brother?   
TG: yeah   
TT: You haven't mentioned him since we were kids.   
TG: dude i barely remembered the guy  
TG: he just  
TG: showed up  
TG: and inserted himself into my life  
TG: went to fucking gratuitous lengths to get me worked up  
TG: then one day  
TG: out of nowhere  
TG: yo sup by the way i am fucking related to you   
TT: How do you even know he's telling the truth?   
TG: strider   
TT: Huh?   
TG: his last name is strider   
TT: _Oh._   
TG: and the only people who know that name  
TG: are you and mom   
TT: That doesn't necessarily mean he's your brother.  
TT: Anyone could have a name.   
TG: but how the fuck would he know that was my name  
TG: i seriously havent told that to anybody  
TG: its not like he got a fucking court order to look at my original birth certificate come on   
TT: I suppose I'd just be hesitant to take anything he says at face value.  
TT: The way you've described him makes him sound extremely suspicious and untrustworthy.  
TT: And worst of all, smart.   
TG: it makes sense though  
TG: hes got the same dumb anime hair  
TG: and he wears the same shades my bro did  
TG: and talks the same way and walks the same way and holy shit im a fucking moron  
TG: i dont know how i didnt fucking realize it  
TG: fuck   
TT: Well.  
TT: Assuming it's true,  
TT: That is certainly... awkward.   
TG: are you fucking kidding me  
TG: all the shit i said about him  
TG: jesus dick awkward does not even BEGIN  
TG: i want to gouge my eyes out   
TT: Would it... make you feel better if I deleted those logs?   
TG: unless you can delete like  
TG: the mental log of me beating off while thinking about him  
TG: 20 times  
TG: and me being 100% sure i wouldve let him plow me if he hadnt told me that   
TG: no   
TT: Oh boy.  
TT: I don't really know what to tell you.  
TT: I'm sorry.   
TG: im freaking the fuck out  
TG: like  
TG: what the fuck  
TG: what the fuck do i even do   
TT: Don't sleep with him?   
TG: jesus christ of course im not going to fuck him now  
TG: but its not like i can just stop talking to him   
TT: Why can't you?   
TG: im going to have to talk to him about his fucking movie obviously   
TT: Have you even signed a contract yet?   
TG: no  
TG: but   
TT: You could always just back out.   
TG: i just shelled out like a gazillion dollars to buy the copyright of pony pals  
TG: what the fuck am i going to do with the copyright to a bunch of shitty horse books   
TT: You could sell it again?  
TT: It certainly seems preferable to being constantly reminded you are sexually attracted to a member of your family.   
TG: but  
TG: fuck  
TG: even without the movie bullshit can i really cut him out  
TG: hes fucking bro  
TG: i HAVE to see him again  
TG: you dont meet your long lost fucking brother and just go  
TG: welp nice meeting you see you again in another 27 years  
TG: i figured he was fucking dead at this point   
TT: And what if he continues to pursue you even after this revelation?   
TG: what  
TG: but hes my brother   
TT: There's thing little thing called "incest".  
TT: You may have heard of it.   
TG: but thats  
TG: youre not supposed to  
TG: hfgaashd b fvbdvdayvgcpy 870 sdaw wdxefwctldsjfhvghsahgfhcsbha   
TT: From everything you've told me, he sounds kind of... like a freak?  
TT: I mean, _maybe_ you've been reading him wrong the whole time.  
TT: But it seems more likely to me that he's just deranged.  
TT: All the more reason for you to cut contact with him.   
TG: but  
TG: fuck  
TG: i dont know what to do   
TT: Well, it's your decision, Dave.   
TG: can it not be  
TG: can you just make all my life choices for me  
TG: that would be so much easier   
TT: If you want that, why not ask Mother?  
TT: I'm sure she will be more than happy to dictate every aspect of your life to you.   
TG: really  
TG: is that where youre going to take this conversation  
TG: "rose is a bitch about mom for no reason part 9 million"   
TT: Dave, I'm kidding.   
TG: yeah i know  
TG: im just going to  
TG: go lay down  
TG: forever  
TG: talk to you later sis   
TT: See you.  
TT: I hope you feel better.

turntechGodhead [TG] ceased pestering tentacleTherapist [TT]


	6. Chapter 6

The coming days pass in a daze, your mind reduced to a perpetual stupor.

You're trapped in a cycle. Your stressed mind makes it next to impossible for you to get to sleep, but once you finally do, your desire to pull yourself out of bed is about zero. You stop even turning your alarm clock on; you go to bed as soon as you're tired and get up as soon as you physically cannot stand to lay in bed any longer. You spend your few waking hours to eat and shower and generally fret over what the fuck you're going to do about your little problem.

Said problem also has yet to say a word to you since your last confrontation. You can't figure out whether this makes you feel better or worse, given that you spend half the time dreading having to ever speak to him again and the other agonizing over all of the things you wish you could ask him.

This state obviously has not gelled particularly well with your prior commitments. You thankfully don't have many this time of year, and shrugging off an interview wasn't of much consequence, but there's a charity auction you've been signed on for for months, and you'd kind of look like a piece of shit if you backed out.

You spend a short measure of time deliberating it and eventually decide you'd rather look like a piece of shit than actually leave your apartment.

"Eridan, I want to cancel for the auction tomorrow," you complain to your manager over the phone, making not even the slightest of efforts to conceal your miserable demeanor.

Eridan, of course, will hear none of it. He immediately huffs and takes on a scolding tone. "Like fuck you are. I've been talkin' this shit up for months, this is the biggest and best PR stunt we're gonna see for years. You'd be a fuckin' imbecile to drop this now." 

You're tired. You're tired and lazy and pissed off and you don't want to _deal_ with any of this, least of all _him_. "The fuck do you think you are, my mother? I pay you to _manage_ my schedule, not _dictate it to me._ "

Eridan laughs balefully. "Yeah, I wonder what your mom'd think about this. Maybe I'll give her a little phone call, how's that sound?"

God, you'd never hear the fucking end of it. You draw back defensively. "What? No, Jesus, don't tell her —"

"I don't care _what_ kinda issues you've got, you're _going_ to that auction," Eridan forcefully proclaims. "You're gonna go and you're gonna drop a fuckin' truckload of cash on some frivolous bullshit and save a bunch of kids with cancer or diabetes or what the fuck _ever_ , and more importantly, you're gonna _make yourself look good._ "

You search for any good reason or excuse you can feed him to get out of this, but you come up woefully short. You eventually settle on whine so pitiful that you cringe the moment it's left your mouth: "... but I don't _want_ to."

"Too fuckin' bad," Eridan barks. "Know what's gonna happen if you don't show up?? I can just imagine the headlines now. 'Lalonde pulls out of charity auction, dooms hundreds of orphans to slow and agonizin' starvation'. 'Lalonde is a huge worthless sack of dicks who'd rather sit on his stupid bony ass all fuckin' day and cry about some garbage that probably doesn't even fuckin' _matter_ than contribute to AIDS research'. 'Lalonde decides to withdraw from all activities that don't include suckin' his own —'"

" _God,_ fine, I _get it,_ " you groan, cutting him off. "I'll go to the stupid fucking auction."

" _Good._ Now get lost, I've got work to do."

"Goodbye, Eridan," you say dryly, before hanging up the phone.

You crawl into bed and sleep for the rest of the day.

When tomorrow finally rolls around, you get up "early" — at 3 PM — several hours before the event is scheduled to begin. You know that the longer you wait to get ready the more likely you are to just not show up, so you shower, get dressed and prepare to sit about doing fuck all for the next three hours. 

You listlessly trawl through the internet to kill time. It's a droll ordeal; there isn't even any particularly irritating gossip about you or your family floating about. You don't know whether you're relieved or about to shit your pants when Dirk pesters you.

timaeusTestified [TT] began pestering turntechGodhead [TG]

TT: Hey. Are you there?  
TT: I've been meaning to give you some space.  
TT: But it's been a couple of days and I still haven't heard from you.  
TT: Just wondering what's up.

You freeze.

Oh god, what do you fucking _say?_ You have to leave in a few minutes anyway, so you consider just ignoring it — however much you've agonized over him through the past several days, you were utterly unprepared for the reality of actually having to interact with him again. It seemed like a distant abstract but now he's speaking right to you and you don't know what to fucking do.

TT: Well, either you're not there or you're ignoring me, so I'm gonna go.

For better or worse, you make a snap decision.

TG: ugh wait   
TT: Yeah?   
TG: look its just a lot to deal with  
TG: a week ago i thought you were a totally different person from who you are and did some things i shouldnt have and wouldnt have if you were just upfront with me  
TG: so yeah im more than a little pissed off about it   
TT: I see.   
TG: just  
TG: jesus  
TG: why the fuck didnt you just tell me  
TG: 10 fucking years ago even  
TG: all you had to do was send me a fucking letter and i would have been glad to see you again   
TT: I didn't want you to favor me just because I'm your brother.  
TT: I waited to establish a non-nepotistic professional rapport before informing you of our relation.   
TG: thats such a crock of bullshit  
TG: you didnt blow thousands of dollars on a ticket to vanity fair just so id judge your script impartially   
TT: Except I clearly did, as evidenced by the fact I was there.  
TT: So, you're wrong?   
TG: im not contesting that you did it douchefuck im contesting your purported motivation for doing so  
TG: why do you own a website that is all pictures of my lips???   
TT: Oh, you found that.   
TG: yes i fucking found that   
TT: I get pretty good advertising revenue out of it.   
TG: seriously   
TT: Yeah.  
TT: It gets a fair amount of traffic, mostly just out of infamy.   
TG: that wasnt what i was seriouslying at   
TT: Then what are you seriouslying at?   
TG: you dont expect me to actually believe thats the only reason you run a website like that   
TT: Why else would I run it?   
TG: are you fucking  
TG: jesus   
TT: I have no idea what you're talking about.   
TG: youre just taking the piss out of me now   
TT: Maybe it would be helpful if you'd actually tell me what it is you're accusing me of doing instead of just euphemistically dancing around it and expecting me to read your mind.   
TG: god youre fucking impossible  
TG: i have places to be bye

turntechGodhead [TG] ceased pestering timaeusTestified [TT]

You sign out of Pesterchum so quickly that you're actually breathing kind of heavily when you're done.

This man is the most maddening and obtuse piece of shit you have ever met, and you're prepared to spend several hours dwelling on the implications of his willful ignorance, but you do actually have to get up and leave for the auction so you do your best to push it to the back of your mind. With a frustrated groan, you get up and make your way over to Aradia's apartment, hastily rapping at the door.

"Aradia, you ready?" you call out, antsily shifting your weight from leg to leg.

The door opens shortly after; Aradia stands on the other side, appropriately trussed up for the event. "Yes," she succinctly answers, stepping out when you move aside.

It's a pretty big event so you take a limo with a driver. Your bodyguard, a tall and muscular man sporting rectangular sunglasses and an unfortunate Cageian haircut, is waiting by the limo when the two of you reach the parking lot. He maintains a stonily professional demeanor as he opens the car door so the three of you can settle inside. 

"Sup," you greet him.

A bead of sweat visibly trickles down his forehead.

You refresh your driver on the address the auction is being held and lean back lazily in your seat. As the vehicle pulls onto the road, Aradia looks to you with a subdued microexpression that you've come to learn means "concerned". Or "constipated", sometimes. Very contextual.

"Dave, are you okay? You been rather..." She pauses, glancing to your bodyguard warily. You're not sure why she decided to ask that question while you're sitting with a guy neither of you can say anything in front of. "Ever since... well."

You can only imagine what she must be assuming happened; you want to tell her, but you know that'd be a mistake. It's not that you don't trust her not to blab — you don't trust _yourself._

You honestly don't know if you wouldn't still go through with it if he asked.

Beyond your own self-focused revulsion (which you also aren't entirely sure is a genuine reaction or you trying to force yourself to feel whatever you're convinced is expected of a person in your situation, a fact that only feeds back into the disgust and guilt), you... aren't actually sure it would be that big of a deal. 

It isn't as if anyone other than you and Dirk — and Rose — even _know_. It's not even public knowledge you were adopted; you don't tell the media much of anything that isn't blatantly fabricated, and you look enough like your sister and mother that no one ever questions it. There wouldn't be any reason for anyone to suspect that you're related, and while it'd certainly be fantastic blackmail material, you can't see what Dirk would get out of it by lording it over you. His disdain for your money is so visceral and genuine that you have little doubt when he says he wants nothing material from you, and if he wants to fuck, destroying you publicly seems like a bad way to maintain an ongoing sexual relationship.

There are a million other reasons that sleeping with Dirk would be idiotic that have nothing to do with the whole incest thing, but your brain has latched onto that one as the critical stumbling block and the more your mind gradually picks apart your inhibitions, the less salient your other concerns seem.

And if you do decide to be a colossal moron and fuck him anyway, what would she think of you if she knew the truth? You wouldn't be able to hide your relationship from her for very long. You're sure she wouldn't tell, but what if she's so revolted she quits? Or much more likely, what if she gives you absolutely no fucking visible indication of what she thinks of it and leaves you to wonder if you disgust her?

"I'm fine," you lie.

 

***

 

You arrive at the place of the auction a bit early; the event is being held at an upscale hotel in the city, and the walkway up to the imposingly large front door is wreathed by a writhing horde of paparazzi and reporters clamoring for photographs and stray words from VIPs. When you step outside of your limousine onto the carpet, you take a moment to appreciate the practical application of your shades as you drown in the blinding light of the cameras' flash.

The entrance to the building is crawling with its own security — bringing just Equius is looking like overkill. You let him have a rendezvous with the security in the building before you and Aradia join the steady stream of people heading into the event hall. Your bodyguard returns not long after to tail you from a safe distance, lurking around the periphery of the party but always within sight.

You wade through the crowd, shaking hands where accosted and brusquely brushing off at least two reporters, and make your way over to the expansive buffet. You take a plate and a fork and mozy your way down the length of the table, picking up shit that looks edible. Aradia keeps close by, but doesn't seem interested in the food.

"Well, if it isn't the Michael Bay of shitty movies."

The sound of that voice is like a knife to the gut. It's loud, it's smug, it's grating, and it inspires an immeasurable degree of reflexive rage. You look over your shoulder to locate the source, and sure enough, it's _him_ — all five-foot-six-inches of anthropomorphic shit.

"Michael Bay is the Michael Bay of shitty movies," you calmly retort as you turn, careful to keep the worst of your irritation from your tone. You notice that next to Vantas is some kind of gangly, scrawny nerd you don't recognize; you look him up and down with a critical eye. "Who's this? Your boyfriend?"

Karkat's face contorts into a unconstrained furor. It takes all of your willpower to not bust out laughing — it's so easy to get his goat it's unreal. "This is Sollux, my _assistant,_ " he snarls, and if looks could kill you'd be dead twenty times over. 

Sollux glances between the two of you; from his look of confusion, you can surmise that he's not familiar with the extent of the enmity between the two of you. Your years long feud has always been a widely reported media spectacle, but the unconcealed palpable hatred you get into surprises even you at times.

You give a half-shrug before occupying your mouth with the bit of food on your plate. "Whatever," you say once you've swallowed, before motioning to Aradia. "This's _my_ assistant, Aradia."

"Hey," Sollux says.

"Hello," Aradia answers.

Once an awkward silence settles and the shit head makes no move to do anything but glower at you with simmering hostility, you make a half-assed attempt at a civil conversation. He's hovering around because he wants a fight, and the best way to give it to him is to just act like you don't give any sort of shit about him. "So, what'd you put forth for the auction?" you ask Karkat, tone measured and blank.

"What did _you_ put up?" he echoes defensively, eying you with suspicion. 

You can barely remember what you signed over. Everything was arranged weeks ago. "One of the original Unreal Airs. Signed bag of nachos." You glance up, thinking. "Uhhh... a set tour."

That seems to have pleased Karkat; he puffs himself up pridefully, smirking in self-satisfaction. "I put up the dress worn by Julia Roberts in _Ghost Date_ , the actual beach house used in _Five Summers at the Beach House_ , the original script of _Dial-a-Wife_ signed by myself and the cast, a day on the set of my upcoming film, and a dinner with me and Sarah Jessica Parker at Urasawa."

"Wow, good for you," you dryly reply. Predictably, he becomes intensely irritated by your non-response.

"While it's up there, I hope your fat crusty anus clenches around your brittle pencil neck and separates your worthless fucking head from the hideous bag of shit you call a body."

"Yeah, okay."

He's growing spitting mad now, and it takes all of your willpower to stop the corners of your mouth from turning up into a mirthful smirk. The two of you lock eyes in a tense mutual glare, and Karkat manages to hold his own for quite a while even against your bespectacled stare. You just raise an eyebrow and laugh when he eventually huffs, turns on his heel and storms off to god knows where.

You glance around. It seems that when you and Karkat were having your little chat, Aradia and Sollux meandered some ways down the buffet table, looking over the food and talking quietly to —

 _Holy shit._ Did she just _laugh?_

That was definitely a laugh. Not much of any sound came out but she's got her hand over her mouth and her shoulders shook a bit and they're _smiling_ at each other _and this is the most jealous you've ever been in your life._

"Aradia," you call out, your voice terse and clipped. She immediately turns her head to look to you. "Get me something from the bar, will you?"

Aradia pauses. You don't usually ask her to go to the bar for you; you usually do a great job of spending all night lurking around it without her help. Nevertheless, it's her job to inquire, "... What would you like?"

You hadn't even thought about what you wanted before she asked. You just spit out what you usually get. "Uh, an appletini, whatever, I don't care."

Aradia gives Sollux an inscrutable look. "It was nice meeting you," she says, before quickly departing to the open bar across the room.

The nerd gives her a weak little wave as she disappears in the crowd, and then turns to give you a chilly look. "What'th your problem?"

You snort shamelessly at his lisp. Yeah, _he's_ gay. "Don't you have a midget somewhere to babysit?" you answer, your voice dripping with derision. "The fuck are you bothering me for?" 

Sollux sneers nastily at you, which you answer with the most smug and patronizing smirk you can muster. He looks like he's close to starting a fight, which you'd fucking _love_ — Equius is still lurking a few paces away near the wall and he could probably snap this shithead's spine clean in two like it's nothing — but after stalking forward a few steps, he thinks better of it. With a disdainful huff, he turns and flees through the throng of party guests, leaving you simultaneously triumphant and perplexed as to what exactly that was supposed to accomplish.

Aradia returns shortly after with your drink, which you quickly take from her and begin to promptly consume. "Did Sollux leave?" she asks after glancing up and down the length of the buffet.

"Yeah. Probably had to go change Vantas's drippy shitty baby nappy after I made him dump all over himself," you dryly state. The jealousy flares up even worse when she has the gall to look _visibly disappointed_. Aradia Megido doesn't _visibly anything,_ what the _fuck?_

The realization of how supremely silly you're being begins to set in right around the time you become stricken by the urge to interrogate her about what they were talking about and what he did to make her laugh, but the fact that some emaciated fucking nerd with hideous dweeb glasses and shitty teeth managed in five minutes what you hadn't been able to accomplish in five _years_ thoroughly overrides any shred of sense you may have previously laid claim to.

You manage to restrain yourself, though, moving over to stand off to the side with your bodyguard and fume quietly until the auction proper begins. Equius is sweaty and gross so no journalists come to bother you with him around. You complain to him about a bunch of pointless bullshit, to which he does little but grunt yes or no in response, staring at you like he's five seconds from shitting his pants.

Before long, a speaker comes out on the stage at the far end of the room and announces that dinner is about to be served as the auction is being prepared. You go over to collect Aradia and ask her where you're seated, since you didn't bother to check the lists by the door when you came in; she helpfully reminds you and the two of you make your way over to your table with the settling crowd.

As it turns out, life is a comedy from which you know no reprieve.

"Vantas," you curtly state as you discover him, sat straight across from your designated seat. There are two other people you don't recognize sat at the table, in addition to Vantas's pet nerd. You can't fucking _believe_ this.

And, it seems, neither can he. He doesn't seem to consider the idea that you'd just been sat together; even as Aradia pulls out her chair and sits down, he just looks at you with a sneer. "What the fuck do you want?"

You clench your jaw tightly. "It _appears_ that _someone_ thought it would be fucking _funny_ to put the both of us at the _same fucking table._ "

As the realization dawns on him, Karkat's face gradually falls into a comically devastated expression. Aradia and Sollux both let out little sighs at the same time. "You've got to be kidding me," Karkat complains.

"No, but I'm going to fix this," you announce, before hastily departing from the table. You look around and eventually spot one of the caterers disappearing around the stage into a back area, and you trail him with determination.

You discover a cramped hall full of waiters setting plates for the dinner and moving things to and from the kitchen. You make your way through the traffic until you find yourself someone who looks like they're in charge; there's a woman giving directions to the waitstaff filtering through the area, and when she notices you she comes over to deal with you with barely concealed irritation. "Sir, can I help you?"

"You sat me next to Karkat Vantas," you say, as if that alone should speak for the enormity of the transgression.

The lady looks impatient and run ragged. She gives you a look that very clearly communicates how much she wants you out of her hair. "Is that a problem?"

You force an agitated laugh. " _Yes,_ that's a problem. I do _not_ sit at a table with Karkat _fucking_ Vantas."

"I'm sorry, sir, but seating arrangements are final," she says, before pausing to give direction to one of the waitstaff. When she turns back to you, she immediately cuts off your attempt at a reproach. "We're booked to maximum capacity and there simply is not any room for rearrangement."

"This is unbelievable," you complain. "Who the fuck _made_ these arrangements? This is a _celebrity dinner,_ how the fuck do you give that job to a person who apparently lives in a fucking _cave_ —"

" _Sir, I **cannot help you,**_ " she grits out. "If you would please excuse me, I have a job to do." Just as quickly as it's said, she turns and retreats into the kitchen where not even you are enough of an asshole to follow.

With a histrionic huff, you throw up your arms and moodily stomp your way back into the main hall. When you return to your seat, you carry with you the most loathsome death glare you can muster. Karkat can't seem to make up his mind between smug you failed at something and being as pissed off as you are.

Everyone at the table who isn't you or Karkat strike up tensely cordial conversation. From what you non-participatorially gather, the two strangers at your table are respectively a reporter and a blogger, though you catch neither their names nor their affiliated organizations. The reporter, a blonde woman in her thirties, makes intermittent attempts to grill you and Karkat about subjects ranging from your movies to your finances to your personal lives; Karkat indulges her with coyly affected begrudgingness while you stonily deflect all attempts to pry. The blogger chats vapidly, talks incessantly about himself, and looks at you like you could convince him to crawl under the table and blow you after at _most_ one glass of wine; he informs you repeatedly that he is very well known and important. You're not sure which of them you hate more.

You sit in silence, picking sparsely at the dishes set before you. You are significantly less frugal with your consumption of alcohol; God knows why they decided to put up an open bar at an auction but fuck if you're not going drown yourself in booze now, damned be the consequences.

By the time you've made your way through the dinner course, the auction proper is about to begin. You pilfered a bottle of vodka from the bar and continue your concerned effort to become completely fucking sloshed well into the auction, despite Aradia's reproachful glances.

Eventually the event gets under way. An obnoxious announcer comes up onto the stage and you watch listlessly as he rattles off the list of participating charity recipients. You don't pay attention until he starts bringing out the items for sale.

You make a couple of bids on some worthless garbage you don't intend to follow through on, just so it looks like you're actually participating; you put down a few hundred bucks on some shirt Ashton Kutcher wore in No Strings Attached and inwardly kick yourself when no one out-bids you. Now you're going to have to actually win something notable so the tabloids will have something to report other than how you're certainly going home tonight to curl up in bed and jack off as you sniff Ashton Kutcher's shirt.

Which you might do? You haven't beaten off in days, so you've probably got an embarrassing wet dream in the pipes you'd do well to be rid of. Kutcher is kind of a douche, but whatever, it's not like you're gonna pretend you wouldn't fuck him anyway. You don't exactly have very high standards. Or really, any standards.

You're well on your way to tipsy when the announcer brings out an item that catches your interest. You hadn't given enough of a shit to actually check all of what was up for sale; you're now very glad you did decide to go, because if you'd fucked this one up, both your mother _and_ your little brother would want to beat you up.

John is going to shit his fucking pants when he pulls the fucking bunny from Con Air out of a box on his birthday. He's probably going to reenact the scene on the spot and tell himself to put the bunny back in the box and then actually put it back in the box because he is the biggest fucking dweeb on the planet, and you're grinning slightly to yourself when you put down a thousand dollars.

You have a few other competitors but once you've made it up to five thousand it seems like everyone else has backed down. You lean back in your chair as the auction counts to a close — but at the last moment, someone in dangerously close proximity speaks up.

"Six thousand."

You turn your head and shoot Karkat a look that should very clearly communicate a _what the fuck are you doing?_ , but he gives naught a response but a smug smirk that makes you want to reach across the table and wrap your fingers around his spindly little neck and choke all the fucking life out of him.

You're drunk. You're drunk and you're mad and you want him to fuck off and die and you wish you could kill him yourself and you say, "One hundred thousand." You don't take your eyes off Karkat, you glare him the fuck down so you know you mean fucking _business_ but he's blurry around the edges and just as pig headed as you are. His lip curls up at the corner into a goading sneer, and he doubles your bid.

Everyone in the room is staring at you. The reporter is on the literal edge of her seat. That shitty fucking blogger is tweeting like he's having a fucking orgasm. Aradia and Sollux both regard their respective charges with exasperation, the latter's much more patently unguarded than the former.

You and Karkat have settled into a staring contest that'd make Sergio Leone proud, and you're trying as hard as you can to bore a hole in his worthless fucking skull. Fuck if you're going to back down and let this puerile little shit mongrel win. "Four hundred," you snarl.

"Five," Karkat snaps back just as quick.

"Six."

"Seven."

"One million."

Karkat gives a little snort of laughter and you're _really, honestly_ close to punching him the fuck out. "Two million."

You take a swig of your vodka and it burns but not as much as your hatred does. "Three million."

"Four."

You snap. You don't have a very exciting manner of snapping, even when you're shit faced drunk (a state you are rapidly approaching), but you become just a little less sane. Jaw locked, hands balled into fists under the table, you grit out, " _ten fucking million dollars, you piece of **shit.**_ "

Satisfied, Karkat leans back with an expression of contented condescension. No one else challenges you, and before you know it you're out ten million dollars and up one fourteen year old dirty rabbit you don't even really _want_.

You take a long hard fucking drink.

 

***

 

You wake up with a splitting migraine and a deathwish.

You attempt to groan as you sit up in bed, eyes squeezed shut in the glare of the midday light, but find your mouth and throat so parched just the effort is painful. You also discover that you are naked.

Disoriented, you slide out of bed and go about collecting the clothes strewn about the floor of your bedroom (one article, disconcertingly, appears to be Ashton Kutcher's shirt). You set them on your bed for you to deal with later, and then rummage through your closet for a clean set. You groggily stumble into the bathroom in an old tee and boxers and take a piss. Waiting to make the trip all the way out to the kitchen for a drink feels like an impossibility, so you stick your head under the sink faucet once you've washed your hands. You take some asprin from the medicine cabinet while you're there, though from experience you can tell it's not going to be much help.

Feeling just a little bit better now that your throat isn't drier than the Sahara desert, you stagger blearily out into the living area. You do a double-take when you discover a strange woman moving about your apartment, in the last stages of recovering her clothing.

When she hears you enter the room, she looks up from where she was standing, having just discovered the location of her shoes. "Hey," she says, smiling warmly at you. "I was just about to get going. It's getting kind of late, but I didn't want to wake you."

Asking 'who the fuck are you' is your first instinct, but this has happened so many times that you just sigh and shrug it off. "I was just gonna make myself breakfast, you can stick around if you want," you offer.

You actually weren't; you were going to whine to Aradia to come do it, but you're hoping that making her food will make up for the fact you don't even know what her fucking name is. She seems suitably appeased, and moves to take a seat at the kitchen island.

"Uh, sorry, I don't remember dick from last night," you mumble as you make your way over to the fridge and gather up some shit.

"Can't say I'm surprised," she muses, resting her chin on her palms with her elbows leaned on the counter of the island. "You were pretty out of it towards the end. I'm Lydia, by the way."

You glance back over your shoulder in an attempt to identify her; your vague memory at least places her _ass_ as belonging to the reporter from last night, which you remember better than her face or her name. Her blonde hair corroborates your theory. "Oh, the reporter," you evenly state, turning back to crack eggs into a pan on the stove. _Great._ You wish you'd gone home with the irritating blogger; he at least seemed like an incompetent sycophant.

"Mhmm."

"So, what kind of headline do I have to look forward to? 'Lalonde Embarrasses Himself In Flagrant Display Of Alcoholism'? 'Lalonde: Crippling Erectile Dysfunction'?"

You don't look back, but you can imagine her devilish grin. "Oh, no, you got it up pretty well for a drunk."

"Well, isn't that a comfort."

"It'll be fair," she coquettishly reassures you.

You are not reassured, but don't press the matter anyway. It wouldn't be the first time you've suffered an unflattering article, you'll survive.

You finish making breakfast and give her a plate. You sit with her and engage in a cordial chat as you both eat; she's actually pretty sharp, and though she doesn't make you laugh this time, you get the feeling she could. You could've picked someone worse to go home with, the fact she's probably going to eviscerate you in print aside. You like her enough to not threaten to put her paper out of business, even.

She leaves you her number before she goes; you'd probably consider calling her back if circumstances were different.

Your splitting headache feels a little less splitting by the time you're putting the plates in dishwasher, but not so little that you don't still feel like a massive pile of ass. You wander back into your room, find your phone and flop back down onto your bed, relaxing into the comfortable mattress (you also lean over the wastebasket beside your bed to check if you at least managed to put on a rubber in your alcoholic incoherency, which you thankfully appear to have done). You turn on your phone; you notice Aradia is logged in to Pesterchum, so you send her a message.

turntechGodhead [TG] began pestering apocalypseArisen [AA]

TG: so i just woke up and found some reporter in my apartment   
AA: yes   
TG: i dont remember fucking anything from after the auction  
TG: how smashed was i   
AA: very   
TG: why didnt you stop me from going home with a fuckin reporter while i was black out drunk   
AA: i tried  
AA: i suggested it was a bad idea but you insisted very vigorously  
AA: you vomited on my shoes and left without me while i was in the washroom  
AA: equius and i had to return home by cab   
TG: hahahahahahahahahaha   
AA: im sorry  
AA: did i miss a joke   
TG: no   
AA: ok   
TG: next time just punch me in the dick or something instead  
TG: thatll get me to listen   
AA: ok  
AA: would you please prepare written documentation of this agreement so i can recuse myself from legal liability should the future necessitate i do so   
TG: please dont ever punch me in the dick that was a joke   
AA: i know  
AA: 0_0   
TG: ok  
TG: well  
TG: sorry for however much of a huge shitbag drunk me ended up being last night   
AA: im used to it   
TG: dunno how you put up with my dumb ass but thanks  
TG: anyway got some shit to do ill talk to you later   
AA: goodbye   
TG: bye

turntechGodhead [TG] ceased pestering apocalypseArisen [AA]

With a sigh, you pull yourself out of bed again. You still have a hangover, but you really can't afford to get into the habit of fucking off all day and doing nothing so close to filming, so you're going to force yourself to work anyway. You take yourself and your phone back out of your room and into your office, sit down, and lean back into your chair with a sigh as your desktop boots up.

As soon as you've logged online, you're accosted by an instant message. So much for getting anything done.

ectoBiologist [EB] began pestering turntechGodhead [TG]

EB: so, i was just reading the news this morning.   
TG: is that so   
EB: yes!  
EB: and i saw something very interesting.   
TG: and what would that be   
EB: it's just the craziest thing.  
EB: it says here that you spent 10 million dollars in a charity auction to buy the bunny from con air.  
EB: and that's really funny, because my birthday happens to be in a few weeks.  
EB: i mean, i'm not saying anything, i just think that's a fascinating coincidence.  
EB: that you'd buy something like that so close to your little bro's birthday, you know?   
TG: yes john i bought you a shitty rabbit for your birthday   
EB: i love you so fucking much right now.  
EB: like, you don't even know.  
EB: this totally makes up for all those times you pushed me down the stairs.   
TG: oh come on  
TG: i drop 10 mil on your ass and youre pulling the stairs card   
EB: you didn't even WARN me, bro.   
TG: keep this up and im just gonna sell it back to vantas   
EB: oh god.  
EB: karkat vantas was there?   
TG: yeah he was the guy bidding me up  
TG: tbh i wouldnt have even gone past 50k if it werent him  
TG: so you can thank him for your dirty ass rabbit   
EB: how on earth could you not have told me he was going to be there.  
EB: oh my god.   
TG: uh  
TG: what?   
EB: i would have asked you to get me an autograph!!   
TG: are you fucking joking   
EB: dude, i'm totally serious!  
EB: his movies are like, possibly the best things ever in the universe?   
TG: what  
TG: no jesus christ what are you even saying  
TG: the only thing karkat vantas is the best in the universe at is being a grody little anus toad  
TG: the divine king of shit sat atop his flatulent throne, lording over the pantheon of shitty indian directors  
TG: mercilessly doling out the most heinously droll kind of torment conceivable to man   
EB: there's a pantheon of shitty indian directors?   
TG: yes   
EB: m night shyamalan is one, but who are the others?   
TG: i actually hadnt thought this through at all  
TG: vantas and shyamalan are the only non-bollywood indian directors i can even think of off the top of my head  
TG: i think theres a solid trimurti comparison in here but i need at least a third one to make this work   
EB: uh.  
EB: hmm.  
EB: jay chandrasekhar?   
TG: eh  
TG: hes not great but i dont know if hes bad enough to be mentioned in the same breath as m night shyamalan  
TG: i feel like this metaphor had a lot of potential but it kinda fell flat   
EB: you've got to put more effort into your casual racism.   
TG: ive learned my lesson   
EB: anyway, vantas is awesome and you have no idea what you're talking about.   
TG: did you just like  
TG: forget im basically the most successful director ever  
TG: i could fucking drown you in my credentials john  
TG: i could fucking drown you in all of the fake credentials i could buy on top of that with my infinite piles of money i earned from being gods fucking gift to cinema   
EB: apparently that doesn't mean anything, because he's totally cool and you're wrong.   
TG: no  
TG: no stop  
TG: you dont understand because youve never had to actually speak with him in person  
TG: he is such a fucking douche it is unreal   
EB: he can't be THAT bad.   
TG: no he seriously seriously is  
TG: hes an unbearable little bitch  
TG: and his voice is so fucking loud, holy shit  
TG: its like youre trying to have a normal human fucking conversation with him and hes just fucking shouting at you like he doesnt even realize that he sounds like a bullhorn 24/7  
TG: and if you tell him to quiet down he just gets fucking louder because he has the most fragile fucking ego of anyone ive ever met in my life and i personally know just about every single a list actor in hollywood  
TG: there is literally no one in the universe i could hate more than karkat vantas   
EB: ok, well...  
EB: even if he is kind of a jerk, his movies are good.   
TG: holy fucking shit no theyre not  
TG: do you know anything about film at all   
EB: well, i liked them!   
TG: this is actually making me angry   
EB: yeah, ok bro, i'll stop liking what you don't like straight away.   
TG: no you dont understand  
TG: this isnt a matter of subjective preference  
TG: vantas movies are unambiguously fucking bad in the worst way possible  
TG: in that for some fucking reason hes actually an influential director and screenwriter despite the fact his films are shit garbage trash  
TG: the things that he does in his films impact everything else that comes out of hollywood  
TG: hes basically defined the modern standard of the romantic comedy genre  
TG: everyone in hollywood actually fucking looks to him and his shitty, awful, repetitive, circuitous, shamelessly self-derivative and pandering films not just within the romcom genre alone but as a fucking benchmark for romantic drama in general  
TG: they have no fucking depth or nuance or any social relevance whatsoever  
TG: he just caters to the lowest common denominator and tells the same fucking story over and over and over and over again  
TG: "kinda weird looking socially maladjusted manchild manages to score with ridiculously hot woman played by the most expensive a list actress he could cast at the time of filming"  
TG: that is every single movie karkat vantas has ever made   
EB: i kinda see what you mean, but... ANY film is gonna sound terrible if you reduce it like that.  
EB: and it's not like his movies are JUST that plot. he always writes really interesting characters and settings!   
TG: his settings are still worthless afterthoughts created solely as vehicles for his self insert fantasy  
TG: wow good job dude you have a big enough budget to put everybody in alien costumes and edit the sky weird colors  
TG: totally fucking groundbreaking totally justifies the fact that its fundamentally the same as every other shitty office romcom ever made  
TG: BUREAUCRATS IN SPACE no fuck off   
EB: sigh...   
TG: theyre "different" and "innovative" in the most shallow fucking way possible, he impresses idiots with his surface level obfuscations while continuing to ride off the same established core he knows will put asses in the seats  
TG: he gets praised for being daring and revolutionary when hes easily one of the most stagnant and artistically cowardly screenwriters ive ever seen  
TG: its absolutely fucking maddening   
EB: what about venus in blue?   
TG: oh yeah zooey deschanel and natalie portman making out in waterworld that sure was a fucking risky decision  
TG: really putting his career on the line there  
TG: and even then you could tell that going just that tiny inch off his template confused him so badly he could barely function  
TG: he still wrote in his ugly unfunny author avatar to pointlessly take up screentime spouting his unrealistic infantile storybook views on love  
TG: somehow managing to be more annoying than zooey deschanel which is a feat unto itself  
TG: hes shit and his movies are shit and youre shit for liking them  
TG: im done now   
EB: well, too bad, i don't care.  
EB: i still like them and you're just gonna have to deal with it.  
EB: and remember to get me that autograph next time you see him.   
TG: next time i see you im pushing you down the stairs again   
EB: at least you warned me this time.  
EB: 8^y   
TG: arent you supposed to be studying 16 hours a day or something you bratty little shitgoblin   
EB: more like 36 hours a day, but yeah.   
TG: get outta here   
EB: haha, ok, talk to you later.   
TG: see you

ectoBiologist [EB] ceased pestering turntechGodhead [TG]

Every single fucking time you've tried to work on this screenplay in the past month has been interrupted by _somebody_ , but that ends now. You turn off the damn internet, open the script and set to work, and you're surprised to discover you're able to make immediate headway. Migraine be damned, you actually get through a whole scene in one sitting and set into a good momentum.

And then your fax machine turns on.

 _God fucking dammit, Pyrope._ That batty fucking broad is the only human being left in America who actually uses fax. She gets _really fucking excited_ about fax, because she can 'taste' the paper traveling through the phone line. You try to explain to her that that is not how fax machines work. She does not listen.

You have no fucking idea how that madwoman passed the bar. Besides the fact that she is frighteningly competent, intimidatingly unhinged and kinda hot.

With a sigh, you roll your chair over to the machine and pick up the papers it shits out. As you glance them over, a dread gradually wells in the pit of your stomach — in your hands is the formal screenplay contract for Detective Pony.

Looks like you won't be able to hide from him any longer.


	7. Chapter 7

You stand before your paper shredder, embroiled in a standoff you know you know you won't win.

You look from the sheaf of paper in your hands, to the shredder, and back. You have to get rid of it. You know you do. You can't enter into a contract with him that's going to necessitate you deal with him for months, because you know he'll want to be involved, and you know if you go through with it that you'll _want_ him to be involved because despite how fucking idiotic it is you _like_ him. You know you need to put it through the fucking shredder and be done with it and him and never speak so much as a word to him again.

But you can't fucking do it.

Logically, you know that contacting Dirk again could only end badly. But a part of your mind, one you fully acknowledge to be fucking retarded, wants to think that maybe it _wouldn't_ be a disaster. Maybe you could pretend you hadn't beaten off to the thought of him fucking you fifty fucking times. Maybe you could _just be friends._

The fact that you _know_ this is stupid and a specious rationalization doesn't seem to stop yourself from wanting to believe it.

So it's with a deluded heart that you pull the plug out of the machine and anxiously stomp out into the living area where you have more room to nervously pace. You have out your phone and you see he's logged into Pesterchum, but actually pulling the trigger and _messaging him_ feels like an insurmountable impossibility. You just want to not have to deal with this, ever.

You walk back and forth like a spaz for another fifteen minutes before you actually find the balls to do it.

turntechGodhead [TG] began pestering timaeusTestified [TT]

TG: yo   
TT: Hello.   
TG: ok so   
TG: my lawyer just got me the screenplay contract for detective pony   
TG: and   
TG: im gonna need you to sign it if this is gonna be a thing   
TT: All right.   
TT: Should I come over to your place to sign it?

_No no no no no you fucking moron invite him to the office don't_

TG: yeah thats fine

Dear god you are a tremendous cock.

TT: Is now a good time?

_Never_ would be a much better

TG: yeah i guess

_FUCK_

TT: Ok. I'll be around in about 20.   
TG: sure

timaeusTestified [TT] ceased pestering turntechGodhead [TG]

Your hands are shaking when when you close out of Pesterchum. You are making the biggest fucking mistake.

So you distract yourself by taking a quick and very cold shower. That works for about as long as you're actually _in_ the shower, but once you've dried your hair and gotten dressed you're back to shitting your pants. You spend the remaining time pacing antsily.

When you hear him knock on your door, you are incredibly tempted to crawl under your bed and hide. Instead, you screw up your courage (and your stupidity, given that hiding and never coming out would probably be the much smarter option), make your way over to the front door to let Dirk in. You leave on your shades, this time, and hope he doesn't think anything of it.

"Hey," Dirk says when you pull back the door.

Rather than offer him any greeting, you opt to sort of gape gormlessly at him in the doorway. After an uncomfortable moment, Dirk raises an eyebrow and just pushes past you into the apartment.

"So, where do I gotta sign?"

You snap out of your stupor. "Oh, uh. Here," you say, hurrying over to the coffee table in the living room where you'd left the contract. Dirk leisurely follows you over and drops down onto the couch; you take a seat a comfortable distance away on the opposite half of the L. You pick up the contract and pen from their place on the table and clear your throat uneasily.

"Okay, so the terms —"

"Don't give a shit," he interrupts. "Just show me the dotted line."

"But —"

"Impenetrable lawyer talk. Don't care." He leans forward in his seat and gestures for you to hand him the contract.

You hesitate, but ultimately accede. You take a moment to sign it yourself, then push it across to the table to Dirk. He takes the pen, signs right below your name, and then pushes the contract right back.

"I'm just gonna give you a personal check now if that's okay," you say, pulling your checkbook towards yourself from where you'd left it on the table in advance. Dirk, unsurprisingly, looks perturbed. 

"For what?"

You raise your eyebrow as you glance up at him. "For the script, that I'm buying from you." You finish, tear the check out and hand it over to him, which he very apprehensively takes.

Dirk's face sinks into a frown as he registers what must be a distressing number of zeroes. "This is too much money," he says, brow furrowed uncomfortably.

You sigh. "I have to pay you something, dude."

"I don't want your money."

"Then cash the check and donate it to charity. I don't care what you do with it, you can use the money to wipe your ass if you want, but I have to pay you."

Dirk looks like he wants to fight it further, but after a moment of deliberation he seems to give in. He folds the check crudely, fishes his wallet out of his back pocket and shoves the check in. He looks a little more at ease once he's put his wallet away; out of sight, out of mind, apparently.

After settling back comfortably on the sofa, he looks back to you. "That all I have to do?"

"Uh... yeah. Guess that's it."

He nods. "Cool. Wanna go get something to eat, then? Should probably talk about —" 

You stiffen reflexively and move to stand, a picture of discomfort. "I think it's better if we, uh, if we keep our relationship strictly professional," you hurriedly respond.

Dirk just laughs at you, and after a tense moment of silence, he stands himself. You're not sure how to react until he begins to stalk towards you, expression blank and carefully controlled; you immediately back away, but he follows you until your back abruptly connects with the glass of the floor-to-ceiling window of the western wall.

More than a little panic stricken, you attempt a hasty escape, but Dirk's arm shoots out to box you in. You jump skittishly at the sound of his hand slamming against the glass; you draw your mouth into a thin line and do your best to conceal how very much you're shitting your pants right now, but behind the shield of your shades your eyes are blown anxiously wide.

And then he pulls off your glasses and you're left with nowhere to hide.

He inches forward, expression inscrutable has he stares you down with that intensity that makes you feel like a piece of meat on display. You reflexively wet your lips and don't even realize you've done it until you notice the corner of his mouth twitching ever so slightly up.

"What's your game, kid?" he asks.

"What's _my_ game?" you spit back incredulously, struggling to keep the anxiety from your voice. You settle for something reminiscent of accusatory anger. "I don't have a fucking game, you're — _you're_ the one with the _game._ "

"Oh yeah? What would that be?"

Your mouth opens and closes as you search for a way to answer that without making _yourself_ look like the sick fuck. Shit, every fucking thing he does practically _telegraphs_ that he wants to fuck but he's never actually _said_ it and _Jesus_ he's your _fucking brother_ , you're not supposed to want to fuck your own goddamn brother, what if he's just as socially maladjusted as he seems and doesn't even know what he's doing and if you say the wrong fucking thing then he'll know you've been thinking about him shoving his cock down your throat for weeks and then — ffuuuuucckkkk, fuck, fuck fuck fuck fuck fuck.

"You know what I'm talking about," you grit out, hoping taking an accusatory tactic will work.

It doesn't.

"Nah. You lost me."

You throw your head back against the glass and squeeze your eyes shut. "You shitty fucking _bastard_ — _God,_ just _say it._ "

"Say what?"

"Just say you want —"

"A Fanta? Yeah, sure."

You groan in exasperation. " _Dick._ "

"That's closer to the mark, yeah," he says, and his tone is so even you don't catch it at first.

" _That wasn't what I_ — ... oh."

And there it is. All... hanging out in the open, like some kind of big, floppy penis.

He's still got his shades on, and you feel totally naked under his gaze. He just _stares_ at you like he's waiting for something but _you_ don't know what to do, and you're sure as fuck not going take initiative.

Instead, you make an attempt to evade him again, this time successful. You grab your shades out of his hands, duck under a swipe of his arms, and slip them back onto your face as you abscond to the kitchen area to busy yourself with a pot of coffee. You know you should probably kick him out, but against your better judgment you decide to ignore the problem and hope it goes away. It doesn't, though. The problem follows you into the kitchen and leans idly against the center island while it stares lecherously at your ass.

"I don't even see what the issue is," Dirk eventually pipes up.

You try to maintain a facade of nonchalance, but you can't stop your hands from shaking as you measure out coffee grounds into the filter. "Being related is sort of a huge fucking issue."

"Who gives a shit? It ain't like anybody even knows but me."

" _I_ know. It's fucking gross, dude."

"Oh, come on. You've fuckin' gagging for my dick for weeks like some kind of bitch in heat. We both know you want it bad."

You spill the water all over the counter. Oh _Jesus,_ where the fuck did _that_ come from? He goes from refusing to explicitly acknowledge that this is even a _thing_ to busting out lines you'd be mortified to hear in parody porn.

He snorts in amusement at your expense as you curse under your breath and clean up your mess. "That was _before_ you sprung the fucking brothers shit on me," you growl, resolutely directing your gaze anywhere but at him.

"Haha, nah, you still want me. Shit, I coulda raised you from damn birth and you'd probably still be dying for me to shove my fat cock into your tight little —"

"Oh my _god,_ wow, _stop,_ " you sputter hastily, cutting him off. You face is burning scarlet at this point, and even as you turn away from him, he can probably still see the redness clearly in your ears. You pour the water into the machine and turn it on, trying very hard to conceal the increasingly obvious flow of blood to your groin. Apparently, you are easy as fuck and completely without shame.

Dirk, of course, completely disregards you. Instead of complying, he makes his way over to sidle up behind you where you stand in your staring match with the brewing coffee; when his hot breath ghosts against the back of your neck, you jump.

" _Jesus,_ what are you —"

"Shut up," he says, snaking his arm around your waist to pull you back against him and _holy shit_ you can feel him already half hard against your ass. You mutter out a string of broken curses as he rolls his hips against you and slips his hand up under your shirt, and his fingers are so rough and fucking _cold_ that you yelp and shiver and shudder and push up back against the warmth of his body behind you all despite yourself.

He laughs, brushing his lips against the shell of your ear as he whispers in a husky voice, "Gotta warm up." His hand travels back down again to palm over the burgeoning semi in your jeans, hums appreciatively as he squeezes and rubs your junk and licks over your ear and bites at the lobe and fuckfuckfuck _fuck_ you're going to _die_.

"Coffee's done," you eke out, voice high pitched and strained. Abruptly you wrest yourself from his grasp and hobble awkwardly towards the cupboard you keep your coffee mugs. You can hear him groan with frustration behind you. 

"Quit being such a tease."

"I'm not being a _tease_. I'm telling you no and you're ignoring me, which makes _you_ an _asshole,_ " you spit, more acerbically than you intended but probably less than he deserves.

"No shit I'm an asshole," Dirk laughs. "And you love it. That ain't news to anybody."

"Yeah, uh, sorry buddy, but I think you're overestimating your swag," you return, brusquely pushing him out of the way to pour yourself a cup of coffee.

You seem to have earned a reprieve; Dirk settles back against the island again for now, arms folded over his chest. "You don't honestly expect me to believe you're not into me. It's obvious as fuckin' day."

Electing to ignore him, you clench your jaw uncomfortable and move to the fridge to get cream. As soon as you turn around, Dirk looses one of his derisively fake laughs that never fails to put you on edge.

"Hahahaha, the fuck are you still taking cream in your coffee for anyway? What are you, fourteen?"

You don't fucking understand this power he has over you. He makes you self-conscious of the pettiest fucking things with a _word;_ it's not so different from how you get with Rose or your mother, but both of them relentlessly _pursue_ your shame where Dirk is able to make you feel like an impressionable child with an off-hand comment. He's probably not even _trying_ to do what he does, but you care so much about his opinion of you that it doesn't even seem to matter.

After an awkward moment, you put the cream back in the fridge and give Dirk a scathing look that doesn't do much to make up for the compounded shame of your concession. Instead, you return to your coffee, prepared to take it black like a _real man_ regardless of the fact you _know_ you can't stand it until it's more sugar and dairy than coffee. You take a drink.

You weren't expecting it to be nearly as foul and bitter as it is. You do your best to suppress the repulsed expression that reflexively blooms on your face, but you're sure he saw you cringe anyway. When he quirks a brow condescendingly, your face flares red in your embarrassment.

"Give it here," he says, and before you can protest he's grabbed the mug out of your hands. You huff indignantly as he sips the coffee, and enjoy a private moment of vindication when his face breaks into a look of comically exaggerated revulsion.

"Ugh, no wonder you need to load this full of pussy garbage, this is like suckling an ulcerated tumor on a dead pig's dick," Dirk gags. "You need a new coffee maker _and_ better beans, the hell did you even _find_ this over-roasted pile of festering ass? Squeeze it straight out a monkey's asshole? I sure as fuck hope money did not exchange hands for this rank trash."

The topic of monkey ass leaves you a bit queasy, but you're eager to carry on down any avenue of conversation that _isn't_ about how hard you're about to get fucked. "Isn't monkey shit coffee supposed to be some kind of delicacy?"

"Nah, that's civet shit. Never had it though, expensive as hell. Sounds like bullshit anyway, if I were such a limp wristed pantywaist that I were willing to root through a fucking weasel's dump to avoid a proper bitter brew I wouldn't even deserve to live to begin with. Anyway, your coffee blows."

And with that he dumps the whole pot down the sink.

You gape at him indignantly. "What the fuck, I was going to _drink_ that —"

"Can't have you drinking this swill, shit's criminal. I'll show you how to do it proper after I fuck you, let's go."

Defensively, you cross your arms over your chest and shrink back against the countertop. "Look, let it go. You're not going to fuck me."

"Like hell I ain't," Dirk laughs derisively. "If this shit wasn't gonna go all the way you would've taken any of the billion fuckin' outs I gave you. Only reason I'm still here is 'cause you _want_ me here, I know it, you know it, so skip the hemming and god damn fucking hawing and spread your fucking legs."

The logical part of your mind knows that this guy is batshit insane and every word out of his mouth is an entire fucking Six Flags theme park unto itself, but the dick part of your mind doesn't seem to give a shit. Instead of doing something reasonable, like, say, calling the fucking cops, you just sort of gape at him vacantly as you're paralyzed by indecision. 

"Gotta make me do all the fuckin' work," he grumbles as he stalks over to where you stand. You immediately flinch back, shoulders raised, jaw clenched; he looks you up and down and snorts. "Jesus, you'd think you were some kind of blushing fifteen year old virgin."

You've got nowhere to run as he boxes you in, a hand set on the edge of the counter by either side of you. "Is that what it is? Baby never had a good fuck? You scared?"

Suddenly the incredulity of it all hits you square in the chest, and for a moment it all feels unreal enough to _laugh_. "God, you're _ridiculous_."

That does nothing to deter him; he leans further in until his face is inches from yours. The intensity of his gaze burns on your skin until your laughter fades away back into anxiety, fear, and an egregiously inappropriate core of desire encased in a brittle shell of guilt and artificially obligate revulsion. You awkwardly avert your eyes, but he doesn't miss it. "Look at me."

Your eyes flit up to meet his behind his shades, worrying your lip with your teeth. You freeze when he reaches out to pull your glasses off again and set them aside on the countertop; he follows shortly after with his own.

You think this is the first time you've ever actually seen him without his shades. His brow is drawn and severe over his unnervingly intense orange eyes; they have that same unnatural quality to them that's made your own such a spectacle to the media, and now that you're on the other end of that stare, you find yourself the unsettled one. He looks straight through you and you've never wanted to feel so vulnerable.

So you just give up. You don't want to fight him, and you don't want to act — so you close your eyes and wait for it to happen, and hope all that you've done will be enough to blame him and never have to take responsibility for being such a fuckup.

Your heart beats in your chest so quickly in your anticipation. When his lips finally brush against yours, you release the breath you didn't even realize you were holding, and you melt into him, sighing and shuddering and itching for more but too terrified to break your restraint. Just this little is _so much_ and everything you wanted and not nearly enough; you part your lips, just a bit, and allow him to move against you, testing you, drawing his body closer to yours in time with the slow motions of his lips against yours. He presses against you and you push up back, your hand sneaking its way to settle tentatively onto his arm, and your touch heralds his aggression. You grow bold enough to kiss back in earnest, wetly sucking at the skin of his lips, and the feeling is so _strange_ and different from the women you've kissed, his lips thinner and rougher and wreathed in stubble that scratches at the skin of your face, but the smell of him and the taste of him leave you intoxicated all the same.

When he presses his tongue against your lips you part them and allow him inside, and he's every bit as invasive as you'd expected. He aggressively probes around your mouth, licking at your teeth and your tongue and you push back with your own, sucking hungrily at him and the taste of his spit and the _mentality_ of it. You grow more sloppy and desperate and you're probably drooling all over him but you don't even _care_.

Dirk's hands close around your waist and before you know what's happening he's hoisted you up onto the kitchen counter; you yelp as your head bangs against a cupboard but he doesn't stop or apologize, just attacks your neck with his lips and tongue and teeth until you're pushing every inch of your body up into his touch. You knock off his stupid hat and wrap your legs around his waist and fist your hands into the back of his shirt, feel the muscles rolling under his skin as he moves against you and leaves you breathless.

Your skin is on fire everywhere his lips touch, and you've grown acutely aware of the frustrating presence of your clothing; as he sucks hard at your neck, no doubt with the intent to mark you, you futilely claw at the fabric of shirt. "Take this fucking shit off," you breathe, tugging at his shirt, and he surfaces to laugh at you.

"Don— _mmpfh_ —"

He catches you on the lips again, long and deep, and when he pulls away you have to gasp for air and then what the fuck, he actually slings your body over his shoulder as he makes his way over to the sofa.

"What the fuck! Put me down, I can _walk_ ," you protest, kicking your legs and scratching at his back, but he only grips you tighter.

"Shut _up_ , Christ," he says, right before carelessly dumping you onto the couch.

You flounder precariously to prevent yourself from falling off, but as soon as you've regained your bearings he's descended upon you again, pinning you to the cushions of the sofa with the weight of his body as he kisses you and erratically and shallowly thrusts against you. You're going to fucking nut in your pants if he keeps this up, which you coincidentally _really_ fucking want off your body right now, so you push at him until he gets the hint and pulls back enough to let you clumsily begin to unbutton your shirt.

"Do you have condoms on you?" you breathe out as you shrug your shirt off onto the floor, then move to unbuckle your belt.

Dirk's begun to rid himself of his own clothing as well; after he pulls his own shirt over his head, he asks nonchalantly, "Do we have to use them?"

You pause to sneer incredulously at him. "Yes, we have to use them. Holy shit, dude, I'm not gonna let you fuck me raw. I barely even fucking know you."

He just quirks his eyebrow at you like you're being silly. "I'm clean," he says, as if that's enough of an assurance.

"Oh, and I'm supposed to just take your word for it."

"I trust _you._ "

You gape at him. You hadn't taken him to be a _complete fucking retard._ "Dude, that — what the fuck, that makes me want to do it even _less._ If you're this eager to raw dog _every_ guy you've just met, why the fuck would I —"

He shrugs, returning to pulling off his belt. "I used 'em with other guys. Shit wasn't the same. You're my brother."

"See, sorry, I don't have the fucking benefit of having stalked your every fucking move for the past decade. For all I know you could have run away from a fucking AIDS hospice, I don't trust you, so wrap your fucking dick. I've got some in my bedr—"

"If they're normal size they ain't gonna fly."

"What?"

"My cock's too big. It won't work."

You stare at him, waiting for him to tell you it's a joke. He doesn't. "Are you kidding me? If a condom can stretch over a fucking head it'll fit your dick, dude."

He actually seems to be growing a bit defensive. "It _fits,_ it's just too tight around the head. I'll lose my boner."

"This is a joke. You're shitting me. This isn't actually a real thing you're saying."

"I'm fuckin' old, it doesn't take much," he grumbles darkly.

"If you _knew_ this why the fuck didn't you bring condoms you could actually use?"

"Honestly, I wasn't even expectin' you to put out this quick. Didn't think you'd have such a bug up your ass about it, either."

More than a little big angry, you redo the buckle on your belt with shaking hands and pull yourself up off the couch. "This is unreal. Wow, get out."

"Come on, don't be like that," Dirk says, sounding bored like a parent waiting out his child's temper tantrum. He never takes any of your fucking emotions seriously. 

You want to punch him in the dick. "No! Holy shit, _I'm not going to fuck you without a condom,_ the end, this isn't a fucking negoti—"

"I don't gotta fuck you. Lemme just suck your dick."

"You're probably riddled with fucking mouth herpes —"

"Look, if I had the herps I'd've already gotten it all over your face, so it's not like you have anything to lose at this point."

You pause in the process of picking your discarded shirt up off the floor. Jesus Christ, you can't believe you're actually considering this. You are an absolute fucking moron. Does your penis completely override your brain?

When you make no move either way, Dirk just sighs, shifts on the couch until he's within reach and pulls you down into lap. Flustered, you make some half-hearted protests but he silences you with his mouth every time and your weak attempts to push him away aren't enough to convince even yourself that you actually want him to stop.

It's not long before you give up and return to biting hungrily at his lips; Dirk roughly pushes you back down onto the sofa as soon as he's noticed your accession, breaking away to kiss your neck. You fist your fingers in his hair as he bites and licks a trail down your bare skin, not so patient as he was before, and your chest is heaving in erratic, frenzied breaths when he reaches your belt. He makes short work of the buckle and all but tears it out of the loops of your jeans, and hauls those off your legs shortly after; all that's left between you and him are your thin cotton briefs.

"Nice tighty-whities, bro," Dirk dryly comments.

"Shut _up,_ " you groan.

You can feel him smirk against your stomach as his mouth returns to your skin; he shifts lower until his lips are poised over your clothed cock, and you squirm beneath him, impatient and uncomfortably hard. He drags his tongue slowly up the underside of your shaft through the fabric, and you push up into his mouth, breathing out in a sharp gust. He seems dead set on fucking torturing you because he makes no move to discard your underwear; instead, he braces both of his hands on your thighs and just licks and sucks at your cock through the cloth. He mouths over your balls and just _drools_ , absolutely soaking through your briefs. 

"You fucking _bastard,_ " you breathlessly curse. You try to move your hands down to push off your underwear but he catches your wrists each time, undeterred. " _Please,_ just take them off, _Christ._ "

He looks up at you with a devilish and supremely punchable smirk. "So fuckin' needy," he chides, before seemingly taking some measure of mercy on you; he hooks his fingers in the waistband of your pants and pulls them down and off. You shift awkwardly to assist in the effort. 

Dirk wastes no time; he's back down upon you in an instant, swallowing your cock all the way down his throat. You gasp out and push up into his mouth, overwhelmed by the sudden and powerful sensation — he works up and down your length quickly and enthusiastically, and his mouth is hot and wet around you, but you're nearly _disappointed_ because you're like 40 seconds in and there's no way you're going to last much longer with this much intense stimulation.

You're about a second from blowing your load when he withdraws just as abruptly as he descended; winded from the sudden deprivation, you look to him in confusion. "Wh—"

"Here, hold up your legs," he says, pushing your knees back up against your chest. You comply without asking what he's doing, watching him breathlessly, and you're not prepared for what he does when he returns between your legs.

"Ffffuck, what are you — fuck," you exhale as he presses the breadth of his tongue against your ass. Your immediate instinct is to stop him, because wow, that is kinda gross, but your hands make it all of half-way down your body before you're forced to admit it's pretty nice.

Dirk starts out slowly, lapping gently at the skin around your hole, letting his saliva flow freely onto your skin. He mouths at you with his lips and drags his tongue up over your taint and grins against your skin when you shudder. He grows more bold as you acclimate, pushing more forcefully against the ring of muscle — you take the hint and relax, encouraging his ministrations.

He presses his hands against your ass and gently spreads you open to his tongue. It's a very pleasant sensation, if not erogenous; you feel the tension dissipating from your body as he presses a little deeper inside of you, soft and hot and wet. Your breathing calms and you push up into his mouth, inviting him further, and he is eager to oblige.

He's all but fucking your ass with his tongue now, rhythmically licking in and out of you as you rock up into his mouth. He's not taking much care to actually keep his spit in his mouth, and you can feel it running out along your tailbone onto the cushion of the sofa. Shit, you hadn't even been thinking about stains, you're really gonna have to be careful to not mess up the couch because that's gonna be a fucking _bitch_ to clean and —

Your mental tangent is interrupted when you notice Dirk has stopped licking your butt. You look up to find him slobbering all over the fingers in his mouth. He pushes them in and out of his own mouth, swirls his tongue around them and lets his saliva run down his palm — your neglected cock twitches painfully as you watch in tense anticipation, his little show doing a good job of making you wish he'd put your dick back in his mouth already.

Your ass is already pretty wet from his tongue and liberal drooling, so when he presses his first finger into your ass, it slides in without much resistance or pain. You worry if he plans on taking it much further than that with just saliva — you have a hard enough time fingering yourself _with_ lube, and yours are a good deal thinner than his.

He works in and out of you with just the one for a while, hooking it up to drag against your prostate. You can't help but release a sharp breath each time he hits that spot, sending jolts of pleasure through you; his hands are so much larger and rougher than your own, and it's such an alien feeling but _good_. He slides the second inside and it's a much tighter fit, burns a little more because he's just got the spit and that shit dries like nothing.

"We should probably —" Your breath hitches in your throat as he drives his fingers inside. "— probably get some lube if we're gonna do this," you eventually note.

You're not sure whether it's hot or really fucking disgusting when he just withdraws his fingers and puts them back in his own mouth. You're just going to... not kiss him for a while. Possibly ever. That is a whole lot of ass in his mouth.

Your ruminations are interrupted when he slips his fingers back inside and returns to work. In addition to the fingers, he's started to add his mouth back into the mix; he's focusing mostly on kinda just sucking your balls, which is nice, but the tantalizing stimulation of his fingers against your prostate combined with the tortuously slow and infrequent jerks of his fist on your cock are leaving you kind of desperate. You've long since backed off the edge of your orgasm, but the sense of urgency hasn't dissipated at all — you push up into him, squirming uncomfortably, fist your hand in his hair and do your best to direct his lips onto your dick, but he resolutely ignores you and continues to do whatever the fuck he wants.

Which, as you painfully discover, is adding a third finger into your ass. You're definitely too tight and too dry to handle it, and you immediately tense up at the burning discomfort.

"Shit," you hiss out, tightening your grip in his hair in what you hope is a discouraging gesture. "Three's too much. Not without actual lube."

"Mmkay," he responds, and you're kind of shocked to discover he actually listens. He pulls his fingers out, licks them until they're covered in spit again, and only replaces two when he returns. You release the breath you were holding and relax again, and he resumes an agreeably pleasurable rhythm against your prostate.

He also deigns to finally take mercy on you and move his lips to your cock as well. With his free hand pressing your length up against your stomach, he slowly drags his tongue up the underside of your shaft; when he reaches the head, he releases his hand and swallows you down his throat and you have to bite your lip hard to hold back a pleasured moan.

He begins to slowly work up and down on your shaft in time with the motions of his fingers in your ass, and the sensation of him around you and inside you and against your prostate feels so fucking _good_ that you're just kind of writhing helplessly beneath him, not sure whether to rock up into his mouth or push back against his fingers or _what_. With your fingers tangled in his hair, you urge him to move faster — your cock slides into his throat like fucking _butter,_ so you aren't worried about choking him when you get a little rougher. He obligingly keeps pace with his fingers as you fuck his mouth faster and faster, and it's grown to a point where you can't hold back your breathy moans; you're getting close again and your cock is fucking _aching_ for release and —

You let out a pathetic little whimper when he pulls off and out of you at once, leaving you _yet again_ at a tortuous precipice. You curse loudly and push your hips up into him, but he dodges any direct contact; you try to finish yourself off with your hand but he catches your wrists too, pinning them beside your head. He's looming over you now, grinning devilishly in a way that _so_ very much makes you want to punch him.

"Just let me get off, _Christ._ "

"Nah."

You groan in frustration as his hands trail away from your wrists, fingers tracing a tingling path down your arms to your neck to the side of your face. He stares at you intently as he brushes against your cheek, and the unreadable intensity of his gaze sets your face to burn. You avert your eyes in a feeble attempt to spare yourself a discomfort, but that proves to be an unwise decision when he very nearly succeeds in kissing you with his gross ass mouth.

"Shit," you curse, turning your head just quickly enough that he ends up slobbering over your cheek instead. You draw up your arms to protect yourself. "Keep away with your shitmouth, God, I _know_ where that's been."

Dirk just laughs, pushing your hands aside to drag the breadth of his tongue over your cheek. You slap him upside the head, but not very hard.

Thankfully, he doesn't seem intent on pressing that any further; instead, he lowers his lips to your neck, nipping lightly at your skin. Your fingers find their way to his hair again and you arch up into his touch. He's stopped dodging your dick at this point, but you've backed off far enough from climax that the brush up against his stomach you manage isn't nearly enough to set you back over the edge. You're not any less needy or desperate, though, so you hiss in frustration and try to guide his face back down to your crotch.

Dirk concedes to move south, but only barely. He kisses his way down to your collar, bites you hard enough that you can't help but but yelp, drags his tongue over what is undoubtedly about to become very bruised skin — you curse him unintelligibly and push him to go fucking _down_ but he won't move at any pace faster than his own. His teeth find your nipple to tease the nub, and your breath hitches in your throat when he pulls it into his mouth and begins to suck.

"If you don't suck my fucking dick and get me off _right the fuck now_ —"

"Aren't we demanding," Dirk cuts you off, deadpan. He nevertheless accedes, coyly watching your flushed face as he slowly moves his way down your body. _Very slowly._

"Fuck you. Fuck you so much."

Dirk snorts, but you at least seem to have finally won, because he makes it down to your crotch and eagerly takes your dick back into his mouth when you rudely shove it into his face.

It's actually gotten kind of painful at this point; there's an uncomfortable tightness in your balls and you couldn't possibly get off soon enough. You start to thrust into his mouth as soon as he's got it back in, setting an erratic and desperate pace of your own. He breaks away for another moment, and you're about ready to kick him in his fucking face, but you cut off your own diatribe when you see he's just stopped to wet his fingers again.

He gets his fingers back in and immediately begins to drive them against your prostate in time with the movements of his mouth when he returns to your dick — he's going all out now, moving quickly and sucking hard and massaging you with his tongue and the muscles of his throat and you're pushing up into him, forcing him to take you as deep as it'll go every time. You draw closer and closer to the edge, eyes squeezed shut tightly in your exertion, and you grip his hair tightly in your fist in an effort to ensure he won't be able to pull away this time. Thankfully, fucking _miraculously,_ he lets you go.

You gasp and pant as you erupt into his mouth, all the pent up tension and pleasure bursting forth in waves that course through your body until you're so utterly fucking spent you can scarcely move. He strokes and sucks at your dick until you're softening and totally drained, grinning slyly up at you when he pulls your cock from his mouth for the final time.

After crawling his way up to loom over your body, he reaches down, unzips his pants, and fishes his cock from his boxers; just as you're catching your bearings he's placing your own hand onto his hard dick. You're almost startled — you _knew_ it was large but feeling the thing in your fucking hand is something else all together. It's hot and thick and pulses under your fingers, which you can barely even fit around the thing. He seems as desperate to get off as you were, so you elect to be merciful and set to jacking him off straight away.

And, of fucking course, he catches you off guard and kisses you. Surprise fucking surprise, not only does he have a mouth full of ass, but he delightfully elected to not actually swallow!

You sputter and nearly gag as he pushes his tongue into your mouth, and with it a disconcertingly abundant amount of your own jizz. It's fucking disgusting, both conceptually and in practice — as you rapidly discover, your own semen has neither a particularly pleasant taste nor texture, and the fact you know he just had his tongue halfway up your ass doesn't help matters at all.

But, you... kind of start to get into it anyway? You try to pull away at first, but he just sort of keeps kissing you regardless, and you eventually find yourself reciprocating in earnest as you work his cock in your fist. It never starts _tasting_ any better, but his spectacularly slimy tongue sliding against yours builds a kind of gross appeal of its own.

If the way he's panting into your mouth is any indication, Dirk at least seems to be thoroughly enjoying himself. It gives you kind of a rush to elicit this kind of response from him — really, _any_ response — and even this little measure of power seems to be worth all the more held over a man so otherwise implacable. You give his cock a firm squeeze and earn just the slightest of groans against your lips; you're sort of mentally outpacing your own thoroughly spent dick with this.

He's so keyed up that it doesn't take that long for you to get him off. You watch his face as he comes, eyes squeezed shut and teeth grit, breathing heavily as he shoots his load into your fist and onto your stomach. Your movements slow as you ride out the end of his orgasm, his hands braced at either side of you as he catches his breath. Once he's well and finished, he opens his eyes and looks at you, and you look at him — and then he turns away and goes to turn on the TV, like that was just a whole lotta nothing.

You wipe your hand on your stomach as your own breathing begins to steady, too exhausted to move. You swallow several times and drag your tongue against your teeth in an effort to rid the taste of your own ass and jizz from your mouth, but it seems like that's going to be lingering for a while. 

"Move over," he grunts after turning on the TV. You shift and let him settle in behind you on the couch; it's kind of a cramped fit, but he slips his arms around your waist and pulls you against his stomach. He doesn't seem to mind getting semen all over himself — _you_ mind getting it all over the couch, but you don't think complaining about that would go over very well.

You try not to think about what just happened.

There seems to be an episode of Man vs. Wild on the TV. You try to pay attention for a while, but you eventually start imagining Bear Grylls making out with Jade, and you begin to grow irrationally angry.

"Ugh," you groan when it eventually proves impossible to see his stupid face and not think about his stupid tongue coming out of it and going into Jade's much nicer face.

When Dirk speaks, his voice sounds so close and deep it's a little strange. "What?"

"I don't like Bear Grylls," you eventually proclaim. You hadn't really thought about your opinion of Bear Grylls too much in the past, but you spent a few seconds on it just now and reached a conclusion pretty swiftly.

"Didn't you do an episode of Man vs. Wild?"

"Yeah," you grumble.

"What, was he a dick or something?"

"No, it was fine, I guess. There's not really a reason. I just don't like him."

"Well, okay then."

You reach over and change the channel, but Dirk doesn't protest. You sit and watch quietly for a time; the feeling of his body against your back is... nice, and every once in a while you feel some kind of strange flutter in your stomach that you can't really place as pleasant or not.

So you decide to go and ruin the moment by asking a question.

"Why did you leave?" you eventually inquire. That seems to have been a poor topic, though, because you immediately feel him tense up behind you.

You're sure he knew what you were getting at, but he feigns ignorance anyway. "What?"

"You know, back when we were kids. When I was a kid. You just disappeared. I mean, I know you got out of the system, but — shit, man, you didn't even say goodbye or tell me anything. It was years before I even understood what happened to you."

Instead of answering or really being anything other than an evasive dick, he abruptly moves out from his spot behind you, gets up and begins quickly gathering up his strewn clothes.

"Come on," you say with a tired sigh, sitting up as you watch him.

"Nope," Dirk replies bluntly. "Don't wanna talk about it."

"You can't honestly expect me to not have questions," you complain. "You owe me this much."

"I've gotta get going," he plainly states, zipping up his pants. "We'll do this again some time, yeah?"

You gape at him dumbly, your line of inquiry waylaid by your mental return to the subject of ' _my brother just sucked me off_ '. You open and close your mouth a few times before settling on, "Uh — yeah. Okay."

He makes a quick run to the kitchen to pick up his shades and hat, and he's halfway out the door before he's even gotten his shirt back on.

And then you're alone.

Just kinda sitting there.

Kinda having to think about how you sort of just had sex with your brother. That sure is a whole lot of a thing, that really just happened, and it all hits you at once and _dear holy fucking God you are an idiot._

Stricken by a jolt of something resembling panic, you abruptly and shakily stand up from the couch and begin to gather your clothes. _Shit shit shit shit shit._ You discover a bit too late that your hand is still covered in half-dried spunk, curse loudly, drop everything back to the floor and hurry to the bathroom for a shower.

 _Shit fuck fuck shit fuck._ You quickly and angrily wash the evidence of your encounter from your body, but this niggling sense of uncleanliness persists regardless of how hard you scrub. _Fuck._ You get out, towel off, return to the living room to collect your clothes (and wipe the spunk off the couch with your shirt), and dump them into the washing machine in the utility room by the hall. Hands shaking, you pour detergent into the machine and turn it on.

_Fuck._

You emerge from the utility room and go to find your phone. Your first instinct is to talk to Rose, and you see she's logged into Pesterchum, so you open up a window to message her.

You pause.

God, _can_ you even really tell her about it? It's one thing to have told her that you accidentally thought your brother was hot, but telling her that you actually fucking _went through with it_ fully knowing what you now know — shit.

You settle for an evasive inquiry, moving into your bedroom to throw on some clothes in between your texts.

turntechGodhead [TG] began pestering tentacleTherapist [TT]

TG: rose do you think im fucked up   
TT: Huh?   
TT: What brought this on?   
TG: you know the whole   
TG: brother shit   
TT: Dave, what did you do.   
TG: what nothing   
TG: i just   
TG: i mean its still a thing that i was into him even if i didnt know at the time   
TT: It's not your fault you were deceived. You couldn't have known.   
TG: ok but   
TG: it kinda didnt just   
TG: go away either   
TG: i mean i know it now but its still kinda there   
TG: is that weird   
TT: Given the circumstances, not really.   
TT: It's not that strange. People who are of close consanguinity but were not raised with each other very commonly exhibit sexual attraction in adulthood.   
TT: Since you didn't recognize him as your brother initially, I imagine your particular circumstance would fall in this category.   
TG: huh really   
TT: Yes.   
TG: that makes me feel a little better   
TG: i guess   
TT: Just count yourself lucky you found out before it went too far.   
TG: haha yeah   
TT: All right, I really need to go into town for groceries and if I wait any longer it's going to be dark by the time I get back.   
TG: alright   
TT: I'll talk to you later, Dave.   
TG: bye

tentacleTherapist [TT] ceased pestering turntechGodhead [TG]

_Yeah Dave, fucking smooth as a baby's ass._

"haha yeah"

_**"haha yeah"** _

You let yourself fall face first onto your bed and release a long, tired sigh.


	8. Chapter 8

It's not that bad.

You weren't really sure what to expect in the following days, but as far as crises go, you've had worse. You're not especially _proud_ of the fact you sort of did the dirty with your brother, but you're surprisingly not really freaked out about it. You doubt there'll be any serious consequences, and if you're being honest with yourself, it's not like you really gave any sort of moral shit about incest in the first place. You think back on it and it's just sort of... whatever. It happened. 

What _is_ giving you the shits is much more aggravatingly pedestrian and cliche. A day passes, then two — you're all right. The world hasn't ended.

But Dirk isn't fucking contacting you back.

You don't want to seem needy or desperate, but you... sort of are? God knows you should be glad if the fuck never speaks to you again, but even through all of his relentless assaults of assholery, you still inexplicably fucking _like_ him. He infuriates you close to every moment you're around him, but the moment he's gone he's the only thing you can fucking think about.

You get four days out without a word from, fretting and generally conducting yourself like a piss scared fifteen year old girl. You glue yourself to your computer near on every day, and you _see_ that he's online. The concept of actually speaking to him first doesn't occur to you until then, and you can't muster up the courage to fucking _do it_ until a whole week has passed.

turntechGodhead [TG] began pestering timaeusTestified [TT]

TG: hey   
TT: Hey.   
TG: so uh   
TG: its been a couple days   
TG: since the thing   
TT: It has.   
TG: so   
TT: Are you going to freak out about it?   
TG: what no   
TG: im pretty much ok with it   
TG: i think    
TT: I see.   
TG: yes   
TT: So what is this, are you trying to evasively get me to ask you if you want to do it again?   
TG: uh   
TG: basically yeah   
TT: All right.   
TG: well   
TT: Well?   
TG: are you going to ask me   
TT: Why don't you ask me?   
TG: oh come on   
TT: What?   
TG: look you know this is hard enough for me as it is   
TT: I bet.   
TG: fuck you   
TT: Aren't we testy.   
TG: ugh   
TT: You've already jacked me off and let me blow you, I don't see why admitting you want me has to be a federal fuckin' issue.   
TG: this is stupid   
TG: you already know it why do you have to force me to fucking humiliate myself on top of it for no reason   
TG: the only thing this accomplishes is polishing your already enormous fucking ego   
TT: Is that such a bad thing?   
TG: its a really irritating thing yeah   
TT: Oh well.   
TT: I suppose I'll have fucked it out of you soon enough anyway.   
TG: jesus you are so fucking skeezy   
TG: like seriously you are a 50 gallon douchebag   
TT: S'not like I ever made any claims to the contrary.   
TG: why the fuck am i even talking to you   
TT: Oh, stop fucking crying, you hideous manchild.   
TT: How's tomorrow night at eight?   
TG: fine   
TG: and fuck you   
TT: In due time, sweetheart.

timaeusTestified [TT] ceased pestering turntechGodhead [TG]

You're seething when you close out of the window. It's embarrassing how easily he manages to get you worked up with just a few words.

Then you're just sort of sitting there, attempting to process the fact you now have a concrete date to your deflowering. It seems so much more real than the first time you though it was going to go down, and you're suddenly stricken by the daunting logistics.

You've never actually taken it up the ass. You've done it _to_ a few guys, and more than a few women, but you... really don't know much about how it works? You've never really thought about it; you just sort of stuck it in and hoped for the best.

Now that you're faced by the prospect of actually having to be on the receiving end, it's a considerably more nerve-wracking ordeal. How badly is it going to hurt? He's so large and you're so inexperienced it seems more like a question of magnitude than an 'if'. What if accidentally crap on him? Asses are full of shit, how is that not a thing? Maybe it was a thing and you didn't notice because you were always plastered half to death??

He already stuck his tongue way up your ass without hesitation, so you doubt it'd really be a huge issue even if you did, but you'd really rather avoid any unsavory chocolate surprises regardless. The first few inches of you seemed to be clean enough, but his actual dick is going to be going way further up there. Who knows what could happen??

Maybe Google knows what could happen.

You survey the results; you try incredibly hard to not click on the video entitled "Penis not poop", but your damned curiosity wins out. You're almost disappointed to discover it's just sort of a normal amateur anal video and doesn't have anything to do with poop at all. You're not sure why the uploader found it necessary to specify that the object going into the woman's anus was a penis and not feces — you have no trouble at all figuring that out on your own, and if anything, it made the experience significantly _more_ shitty than it would have been without it. You don't know what demographic they were going for with that one.

You unzip your pants to give yourself some boner room. You don't feel like jacking off and you figure that going through the rest of these results will deal with it soon enough. You navigate back to the first result.

You pour over the information with rapt attention. You sure as fuck aren't going to starve yourself (that'd last a couple hours at best), but the recommendation of an enema seems thorough and practical enough. You make it halfway down the page of replies, contemplating your game plan, when a pester window abruptly fills your screen.

caligulasAquarium [CA] began pestering turntechGodhead [TG]

CA: hey do you have a minute  
TG: uh  
TG: im sort of busy right now  
CA: listen man just hear me out  
TG: what is it  
CA: so i heard you signed a deal to adapt that fucking PRICKS script to the screen the other day  
TG: where is this going  
CA: im just wonderin why youre all gung-ho to adapt some random assholes screenplay but you wont even HUMOR my pitches  
TG: because your ideas are terrible eridan  
CA: bullshit you havent even read my scripts  
TG: i didnt know you even wrote any  
TG: all you fucking do is badger me to get the rights to shrek  
CA: that was before i knew youd take a script even without them  
CA: but i have a script lalonde  
CA: ive been working on it for years ever since me and you were a thing i had lofty goals  
CA: i still do  
CA: here just give me a chance bear in mind this is a first draft  
caligulasAquarium [CA] sent turntechGodhead [TG] file "shrek5.pdf"  
TG: ugh fine  
TG: ill look at it at least  
CA: SWEET let me know what you think  
  


TG: oh my god   
TG: are you kidding me with this shit   
CA: with what   
TG: everything   
TG: but mainly   
TG: dan   
TG: really   
CA: whats wrong with dan   
TG: you're not even trying to be even the littlest bit subtle are you   
CA: i have no idea what youre talkin about buddy   
TG: nevermind

TG: holy shit   
CA: i told you itd be good

  


The script only grows more and more unreal as you read through it. It's easily one of the most painfully contrived self-insert fantasies you've ever read, and there isn't a single point where it ceases to escalate in its enormity. You get about 20 pages in before the novelty begins to wear and it becomes more painful than entertaining; you skip through closer to the end to discover it's taken a turn for the maudlin. By the time you reach the closing scene, you think you might just hurl.

TG: "my time here is eridone"   
TG: are you for real   
CA: hehehe yeah i thought that was pretty clever too   
CA: ive been gettin into some comedy lately im tryin stuff out   
TG: no it doesnt even make sense   
CA: eridone like my name eridan   
CA: come fuckin on lalonde this is easy   
TG: but the characters name is dan   
TG: that would be complete nonsense to anyone who isnt you   
CA: hm maybe you have a point   
CA: ill change his name to eri in my next draft   
TG: christ

TG: what the holy fuck did i just read   
CA: well what did you think   
TG: eridan   
CA: what   
TG: this is   
TG: the absolute worst fucking thing ive ever read in my life   
CA: what   
CA: are you fuckin kiddin me   
TG: no   
TG: well actually some of the scripts jades grandpa used to send me were worse   
TG: but this is way up there   
TG: easily in the top 10 shittiest scripts ive ever gotten   
CA: i cant BELIEVE this this is BULLSHIT   
CA: i worked so fuckin hard on that script dave i poured my heart and fuckin SOUL into this   
TG: apparently your heart and soul are composed of 100% fucking garbage   
CA: this is total bullshit lalonde and you know it i used proper grammar i followed the formatting conventions to the LETTER i did my fuckin research ill have you know   
TG: actually you kinda didnt   
TG: and presentation completely aside its still fundamentally trash   
TG: this is something youd expect some 13 year old girl to publish on her blog not a feature film   
TG: this is abominable i cant adapt this   
CA: come on just help me out here   
CA: tell me how to make it better and i will   
TG: eridan   
TG: i dont care if you morph into william fucking shakespeare overnight   
TG: im not going to direct your fucking shrek self insert fanfiction   
CA: why not   
CA: it wouldnt even be fanfiction if you talked to the dreamworks guys and got them on board come on   
CA: youre a lalonde it wouldnt be hard   
TG: the answer is no eridan   
TG: end of story   
CA: god youre such a bitch dave   
TG: too bad   
TG: pop in one of your shitty shrek dvds and have yourself a nice cry because its not going to happen   
CA: if thats the way youre gonna be then FINE

caligulasAquarium [CA] ceased pestering turntechGodhead [TG]

You roll your eyes as you close out of the window with Eridan, prepared to resume your ass search, but you catch a glimpse of your chumroll and notice Jade is logged in. She doesn't spend much time online anymore, so you use the chance to chat her up.

turntechGodhead [TG] began pestering gardenGnostic [GG]

TG: hey jade check this out  
GG: whats up?  
turntechGodhead [TG] sent gardenGnostic [GG] file "shrek5.pdf"  
GG: oh boy.....  
GG: is this what i think it is  
TG: is it a script for a proposed shrek sequel that eridan just sent to me  
TG: yes  
TG: yes it is  
GG: omg  
GG: i havent even opened it and im already embarrassed for him :X  
TG: why  
TG: you know that fuck has absolutely no shame  
GG: but i do!!  
GG: i guess im just picking up on all the shame he would be feeling  
GG: if he werent a really weird kinda creepy guy  
GG: i guess....  
TG: you should read it its kind of incredible  
GG: siiiggghhh  
GG: wow   
GG: dan??  
TG: tell me about it  
GG: so this is just  
GG: he wrote a story about himself... just randomly meeting shrek  
TG: oh no its not random  
TG: see if you read on youll learn that "dan" is a prophesized hero  
TG: only a man from truly far far away can save the kingdom from the evil waterwitch  
GG: omg  
TG: who as far as i can tell is basically meenah  
GG: hehe well THAT part isnt too far off  
TG: he was also a secret wizard all along  
TG: like he is basically harry potter if harry potter were a grown manchild with a gun  
GG: wow  
GG: omg is he really  
GG: is he seriously  
TG: hahaha you got to that part  
TG: yes  
TG: yes he is  
GG: wow this is so graphic...  
TG: hahaha  
GG: its been so long since i saw shrek but werent shrek and fiona like...... married  
TG: yes  
GG: and eridan wishes shrek was his dad  
TG: yes  
GG: ok then why is eridan having sex with fiona in this???  
GG: wouldnt she be like his mom  
TG: no he has the hots for her  
TG: he wishes shrek was his dad and fiona was his girlfriend  
TG: he has sex with the meenah stand-in too later on  
TG: like thats how he saves the day  
TG: by fucking the evil out of her  
TG: but in her last orgasming breath (???) she casts a spell that eventually banishes him back to the real world   
GG: thats  
GG: thats really really weird dave  
TG: yeah i picked up on that  
GG: i dont think i can get through the rest of it  
GG: its so bad..... he has some sort of serious mental problem id feel bad if i laughed at it  
GG: hehe though  
GG: this does kinda remind me of grandpas scripts  
TG: yeah i thought that too  
TG: gramps would have thought this was the shit  
GG: he would!  
TG: maybe if eridan were a 95 year old nutjob with dementia this would be less sad  
GG: yeah probably >_>  
TG: oh  
TG: hey this doesnt have anything to do with anything but i meant to ask you something  
GG: oh, sure  
GG: what do you need??  
TG: ok this is a really weird question but  
TG: what did you do to  
GG: ???  
TG: like  
TG: when we were together  
TG: how did you not have poop during anal sex?  
GG: O_O  
GG: dave youre right that is a really weird question  
TG: yeah but  
TG: what did you do  
GG: um wow this is embarrassing  
GG: why are you asking me this??  
TG: im just curious its no big deal  
GG: ok.....  
TG: i really need to know though  
GG: eww...  
GG: well  
GG: i guess i just washed my butt out in the shower.....  
TG: thats it???  
GG: yeah  
GG: i never did anything special >_>  
GG: omg i never got anything on you did i???  
TG: whoa no you were always clean thats why im asking  
GG: ok whew  
GG: well i have a pretty good diet i guess so it was never an issue?  
GG: tell your new poopy girlfriend to get more fiber hehehe! :P  
TG: oh i dont have a new girlfriend im just wondering  
TG: just for no reason im not seeing anybody  
TG: not really  
GG: ok then.......  
GG: i need to head out in a little, i should probably go get ready  
TG: ok thanks  
TG: talk to you later  
GG: bye dave!  
TG: wait hold on  
GG: huh?  
TG: you never slept with bear grylls did you  
GG: what???  
TG: like when we were dating you never  
TG: you never had an affair with bear grylls  
TG: right  
GG: um bear grylls is a total hack  
TG: yeah i know  
TG: but you didnt right  
GG: no i didnt  
TG: ok i just had to be sure  
TG: ill let you go now  
GG: ok....  
GG: bye dave o_O;  
TG: bye

gardenGnostic [GG] ceased pestering turntechGodhead [TG]

 _Shit._

You take a moment or two to rue your utter inability to not make a complete ass of yourself every time you speak to her before you make a valiant attempt to push the subject from your mind and return to your butt cleansing search. 

Everything you read seems to recommend an enema or just a shower wash, but if you're being honest with yourself you've pretty much subsisted on trash ever since Jade ceased being in a position in your life to stop you from eating nothing but cheetos, doritos and pizza all day. You're not sure what kind of effect this would have on your plumbing, but you guess it's probably not a very good one? You figure you may as well just do a full on enema, for the peace of mind if nothing else. You also may as well get an actual dildo so you can verify your cleanliness, you suppose.

All that's left is to ruin poor Aradia's day.

turntechGodhead [TG] began pestering apocalypseArisen [AA]

TG: hey can you do me a favor   
AA: yes   
TG: i need you to go out and get some stuff for me   
AA: ok   
AA: what do you need   
TG: ok i need some XL condoms and lube   
TG: and an enema kit   
TG: and like an 8 inch dildo   
AA: 0_0   
TG: i am so sorry   
TG: you can get them at different stores if you dont want to bring all of that to a checkout   
AA: its ok   
AA: ill go now   
TG: wait   
AA: what   
TG: make sure you wear a hat and shades and put your hair up and shit so nobody recognizes you   
TG: i mean people know you work for me    
AA: why dont you just order these online   
TG: then there's a paper trail   
TG: plus i need them by like   
TG: now basically   
AA: well   
AA: ok   
AA: im going to go    
TG: ok thanks

apocalypseArisen [AA] ceased pestering turntechGodhead [TG]

You breathe out; you're getting sort of antsy about this.

You start watching instructional enema videos, which naturally leads to you blundering into a solid half hour of enema _fetish_ videos. They're invariably rather bizarre, and tend to involve the enemee complaining loudly about how horrible and bloated they feel. This is not reassuring. You find one that ends in the recipient showering what is presumably an underwater camera with a veritable torrent of grody butt water; it's certainly mega disgusting but for some reason the revulsion makes it even harder to pry your eyes away for even a moment.

Your enema theatre is interrupted when your phone rings. You hastily pick it up and see that the call's from Aradia; you're a bit nervous when you answer. "Hey, did something happen?"

"No," Aradia says. "I'm in an adult shop. I'm looking at dildoes."

"Oh."

"There are hundreds of dildoes. I do not know what to get and the proprietor is staring at me."

You spin your chair around and push out of it to stand. You move out into the living area to pace more comfortably. "Well, I need kind of a long one —" 

"There are many long ones. Seven inches, nine inches, twelve inches, fourteen inches —"

"Just get something close to eight or nine or something."

"What about the thickness?"

You pause. You haven't really spent much time quantifying the girth of dicks? You don't really know what that would all break down to, as far as numbers go. "Uhhh... I guess... something that's kind of thin, but not really pencil thin? Like, a long but sort of medium girth dildo."

"Okay. What kind of material would you like? There's silicone, jelly, glass, steel..."

"Uh, it doesn't really matter, I guess. Silicone is what they're normally made of, right?"

"I don't know. I don't know about dildoes."

"Oh."

"What about the shape? They have ones that are shaped like rabbits and dolphins. There is a fist dildo."

"No, I just want, like, a dick shaped dildo."

"Okay. There are also many of those. What about the color? There are several in pink and green and an assortment of other colorations."

"Just get me one that looks like a dick. I just want a dick."

"Do you want a black dick or a white dick? There are also some brown dicks."

"Doesn't really matter. Get the cheapest one, I guess."

"Oka—"

"Wait, no, get the most expensive one."

There's a moment of tepid silence.

"I wouldn't want it to like, break off in my ass or something," you clarify.

"Yes, of course." You hear some rustling as Aradia shifts her cell to her other ear. "Would you like it to vibrate?"

You think on it for a moment. "Uh, no, I don't really need that."

"Okay," she says. You can hear her pulling down what is presumably a dildo from the wall. "I think I found one that will work for you."

"Okay. Thanks."

"I'm going to purchase this dildo now. I will return shortly. Goodbye." With that, she hangs up. 

True to her word, it's about fifteen minutes before you hear a knock on the apartment door. You get up and hurriedly move over to answer it; on the other side is Aradia, her face obscured by a pair of enormous sunglasses and a baseball cap. Her voluminous hair erupts from the back in a long bushy ponytail that makes her vaguely resemble a squirrel.

"Come in quick," you hurriedly say, gesturing her in like you're afraid of being caught harboring some sort of fugitive. She looks at you for a moment before just entering the apartment; you close and lock the door behind her.

Aradia makes her way over to the kitchen island and drops off the numerous bags in her hands. You come up beside her, pick a bag, and pull out the object inside; it's the dildo, still in its obnoxious plastic packaging. The first thing you do is look for the price tag.

"Holy shit," you balk. "200 fucking dollars?"

"You told me to get the most expensive one," Aradia evenly replies. She's taken the rest of the items out of their bags while you were surveying the dong, and begins neatly placing each plastic bag within the other. She saves all of them, but you have no idea what she actually ends up _doing_ with them.

"I didn't even know they made fake dicks that expensive. This thing better give me a fucking religious experience."

Aradia tactfully chooses to not reply to that statement, and instead draws your attention to the other things she purchased. "I got everything you needed?"

You give them a look over; she got several different kinds of condoms and lubes, which you probably should have asked for in the first place, given that you wouldn't exactly be surprised if Dirk tried to bust out a latex allergy excuse to try to swindle his way out of it. The enema kit stares up at you forebodingly from its packaging. "Yeah, this is everything."

"Okay," Aradia says, adjusting her sunglasses. They're too big for her head. "I'm returning home. Have... fun."

"Uh, yeah," you awkwardly reply.

And then you're left alone in your apartment with your fake dick and butt hose and all the enormity of what they represent. You stare at the boxes on the island for a time until, finally resigned to your fate, you sigh heavily and open the enema kit. Reading through the instructions in your free hand, you measure out the solution into a large pitcher, pour it into the enema bag, and then dolorously bring the haul into the bathroom to search for a place to hang the bag.

There's a towel rack, but using that would require that you camp out on the bathroom floor instead of the tub and you aren't especially excited by the prospect of spilling shitty ass water all over the floor. You don't know what kind of disaster might amount from hanging the bag higher than the recommended 12-to-18-inches above your body, though, so you put up the bag, suck it up and get some towels to lay out on the floor.

You rather awkwardly remove your pants, settle onto the towel, and follow the instructions to put together the apparatus. You finish setting everything up, lube up the applicator, shift to lay down on your right side, and unceremoniously stick it up your ass. After you grow confident enough that it's up there and isn't going to fall out, you take a deep breath, and release the clamp of the hose to allow the water to flow out from the bag. It feels like... well, just about how you'd expect water up your ass to feel like. It's a bit bizarre, but not really painful; you let it run for a bit before you close off the clamp. The instructions told you to release about a cup of water at a time before resting. You have no fucking idea how long a it takes for a cup of water to pass out of the bag, so you just guess.

You repeat the cycle a few more times, releasing water into your body and stopping it intermittently. You get maybe halfway through the bag before you start to cramp, but cutting off the water and massaging yourself until it goes away keeps you going until you manage the full two quarts.

Then you just kinda hang out there, staring at the ceiling and contemplating your place in life. And all the water up your ass.

You're able to let it sit for about ten minutes before you absolutely have to go. You remove the applicator and relocate yourself to the toilet — thankfully without any leakage — and enjoy the watery fruits of your labor.

_Ugh._

It was kind of an unpleasant experience, but you want to be thorough. You do it again, and then a third time, satisfied when the water comes out clear. You hang out on the toilet for another 20 minutes to be safe, and then when you're absolutely positive nothing else is coming out, you clean up and move to the second phase of your ass excursion.

Lain out on your bed, with your new dildo free from its packaging and ready to go, you prepare for your progress check. You aren't even really concerned with getting off at all at this point, so you lube up, stick your fingers in, and methodically prepare yourself for the dong. You feel so bizarrely empty and sterile.

You bite open one of the condoms, roll it over the toy, and lubricate it sufficiently for insertion. You lift your knees back and press its head to your entrance; it's not _that_ wide, so it slips in without much discomfort. You exhale as you acclimate to the fullness, then begin to work it in and out, gradually spreading the lubricant to the depths your fingers couldn't reach.

You get into a bit of a rhythm, able to push in and pull out smoothly and easily with little resistance, but you eventually notice that the depth seems to have stalled. After shifting a bit, you try to press the toy further in — gently at first, and then with a little more pressure — but it seems no matter how hard you push, the thing won't make it any deeper than halfway. You worry your lip with your teeth and try stilling for a bit, trying to get into some even breathing and relax, but even once you've chilled out so thoroughly you've lost your semi it's still not going any further in.

 _Is_ it because you're not really into it? You fumble to pull your laptop off your bedside table (awkwardly and one handedly, in effort to not get ass gunk all over it), open it up, and do some quick searches through some porn sites until you find something that looks like you could get off on. You watch some lesbian nurse video that kind of blows, but the girls are hot enough that you don't have much trouble getting it up eventually.

You settle back and stroke your cock up to full mast as you watch, still holding the dildo inside of you. Once you're throbbing and sufficiently horny, you try moving the toy in time with the motions of your fist on your dick. No dice.

You kind of get into a fantasy where the hotter nurse from the video has a dick and is fucking you, which is nice, but that doesn't seem to be doing anything to actually help the dildo make it anywhere past half-way. You make it through the whole crappy movie with no luck. Horribly frustrated, you pull out and give up.

Do you have a defective ass? You look down at your gross hands and make a quick trip to the bathroom to wash off, then return to your laptop for another Google adventure.

Naturally the first thing you click is the link boldly announcing the age of its questioner, but that isn't of any use. Neither are the first, or the third; in the fourth you find a post that sounds like it's describing your situation, but your stomach rapidly plummets as the tale progresses.

_holy fucking shit_

You really don't want to rupture your ass, so you try a number of other searches, but everything you find seems to be concerned with stretching the anus for girth, not depth. You find a few that mention similar problems, but they never seem to end any way other than "but then one day it magically fit and everything was right with the world."

You're sort of on a timetable, so you need to figure this shit out now. You look through your chumroll for ideas for who to bug about it; you don't know if anyone you know would actually be able to help, but it doesn't hurt to exhaust your options.

You never had that problem with Jade and you were the first person she ever slept with, so it's not like she'd have any advice for it. You doubt Aradia would be into that; Zahhak just weirds you out; John is way too straight; Eridan is probably still a fucking virgin. Terezi... you figure there's pretty much no chance Pyrope isn't a complete ass fiend, but asking your lawyer for assplay advice is probably outside the jurisdiction of your professional relationship. Vantas — why the fuck do you even still have his chumhandle?

You take a moment to delete it from your contacts before turning to your good old sister. She's probably not going to have anything helpful to say on the subject, but you feel like bothering her with it anyway. You're the best brother.

turntechGodhead [TG] began pestering tentacleTherapist [TT]

TG: rose i have an emergency   
TT: What?   
TT: What happened? Are you okay?   
TG: ok its not really an emergency at all   
TT: ...   
TG: all right basically i was masturbating   
TT: Oh, for Christ's sake.   
TG: no hear me out   
TG: so i was masturbating   
TG: like anally    
TT: Dave, please.   
TG: and i was using a toy   
TG: but i couldnt get it in all the way   
TG: whats up with that   
TT: I don't... know?   
TT: Why are you even asking me this?   
TG: dont you ever engage in a little butt fun rose   
TT: No.   
TT: I know absolutely, literally fucking nothing about this topic.   
TG: i dont believe that   
TG: come on you have to have at least pegged a guy   
TT: No, Dave.   
TG: not even a little   
TT: No.   
TT: Please stop.   
TG: who am i supposed to ask about this if not you then   
TT: I don't know? Look it up on the internet.   
TG: i did and i couldnt find anything   
TT: Then just masturbate without getting it in all the way. It's not like you're hurting the dildo's feelings.   
TG: no i have to get it up there   
TT: Why?   
TG: its a manner of principle at this point   
TT: You could always ask Mother about it. She'd probably know.   
TG: what the fuck   
TG: no   
TG: no rose im not going to ask my fucking mom for anal masturbation tips   
TT: Why not?   
TG: because thats weird as hell   
TT: It's not much weirder than asking your sister for anal masturbation tips.   
TG: no its several magnitudes more weird than that   
TT: Then you're on your own.   
TG: some help you are   
TT: I'm leaving now.

tentacleTherapist [TT] ceased pestering turntechGodhead [TG]

You roll your eyes and single out your next victim. You seem to be in luck tonight; Terezi's logged in, too. This is probably a direly inappropriate avenue of conversation to have with your lawyer, but fuck it — she's honestly not gonna give a shit, and you kinda need to figure out a solution to this issue before you run into a wall with a real dong.

turntechGodhead [TG] began pestering gallowsCalibrator [GC]

TG: pyrope   
GC: HI DAVE   
TG: ok quick question   
TG: do you like anal   
GC: HOW DID YOU KNOW!   
TG: just a hunch   
TG: ok so   
GC: http://tinyurl.com/BESTDRAGON IM GETTING ONE OF THESE TOMORROW >:D IM SO EXCITED   
TG: what   
TG: i   
TG: what   
GC: WHAT??   
TG: what do you say to that   
TG: i just dont know   
GC: OH   
TG: okay   
GC: DID YOU HAVE SOMETHING YOU WANTED TO ASK??   
TG: i did but   
TG: i feel like it would be kind of pointless   
TG: now   
TG: after that   
GC: WELL WHAT IS IT!   
TG: well   
TG: i was putting a thing in my butt   
GC: A THING   
TG: i dont know after seeing that thing i feel like calling it a dildo would be like   
TG: wow   
TG: it doesnt even rate   
GC: http://tinyurl.com/MMMCRACKERS   
TG: oh my god   
TG: what the fuck   
GC: HEHEHEHEHEHE >:]   
TG: how is that even supposed to   
TG: nevermind forget i even brought that up i dont want to think about it   
TG: ok anyway i was putting a thing in my butt   
TG: and it wouldnt go all the way in   
TG: i got it like halfway and it just hit a wall   
TG: i dunno how else to describe it it wouldnt go in   
TG: is that normal   
GC: HM   
GC: I HAVE PUT A LOT OF THINGS UP MY BUTT DAVE   
GC: BUT THAT HAS NEVER HAPPENED TO ME   
TG: oh   
TG: damn   
TG: well uh   
TG: thanks anyway   
GC: IM SORRY I COULDNT HELP   
GC: GOOD LUCK WITH YOUR BUTT >;]   
TG: yeah uh good luck with your dragon penis or   
TG: whatever that is   
GC: THANK YOU DAVE   
TG: bye

turntechGodhead [TG] ceased pestering gallowsCalibrator [GC]

You do a few more Google searches in attempts to find the answer to your quandary, but you come up frustratingly short time and time again. You even open a question on Yahoo Answers, but the only response you get consists of one guy answering with "*farts*" and nothing else. You wait a few minutes with no luck and choose his answer as the best response. _*Farts*_ is pretty much how you feel about this whole ordeal.

You are faced with a problem. You've got less than a day before you're scheduled to receive the dick, and only a few hours before you need to go the fuck to sleep. Time is running out fast.

It's like you're watching yourself in a horrified daze as you reach for your phone and stoop to the deepest levels of desperation imaginable.

tipsyGnostalgic [TG] began pestering turntechGodhead [TG]

TG: baby :)))   
TG: hi mom   
TG: what do u need hnoey   
TG: *honey   
TG: ok this question is seriously like super embarrassing so dont give me shit for it   
TG: u know i love u no mattater what sweetie waht is it :)   
TG: youve uh   
TG: done anal before right   
TG: lmao   
TG: srry i may have to give you shit for this one   
TG: god dammit mom   
TG: oe quiet down i was makin a pun   
TG: oh   
TG: ok enuffa that whats ur question   
TG: well i was doing it with a girl   
TG: ehehehe way 2 go davey ;)   
TG: oh my god mom no   
TG: no thats not the reaction you as my mother have to me talking about sex   
TG: gosh well what am i SUPOPSED to say than   
TG: nothing mom   
TG: you arent supposed to say anything youre supposed to wait for me to finish my question and then answer it instead of being way more comfortable with this than is socially acceptable   
TG: waht honey ur not makin any sense at all   
TG: this is an incredibly weird thing for a son to ask his mother   
TG: you should think this is weird   
TG: well that seems ttly needless and frnkaly p dumb an obstructionary 2 the pupposes of havin the conversaysh in the 1st plaec   
TG: *having   
TG: mom please   
TG: SIGH ok   
TG: eewww davey das gross   
TG: im ur mommy dont talk abate those thing 2 me   
TG: im scatandalized   
TG: shocked   
TG: SHOCKED that u would even THINK 2 say these things to me   
TG: ur darling pure innocent mother   
TG: a VIRGIN   
TG: ok dont get ridiculous   
TG: lmfao jesus just what IS it alredy   
TG: all right   
TG: dont fucking interrupt me this time   
TG: fien   
TG: ok   
TG: so i was doing it with a girl   
TG: like in the butt   
TG: i mean i was doing it in her butt not mine   
TG: like with my penis   
TG: dave pls   
TG: mom i told you to not interrupt me   
TG: so i was doing it and   
TG: i couldnt get it in all the way   
TG: into her butt   
TG: wat was she too tight   
TG: no it was like   
TG: it got in the first few inches fine   
TG: but then it was like i hit a wall   
TG: and it wouldnt go any further than that   
TG: i never had that happen with anybody else   
TG: hmmm   
TG: how deep were u able to get it wolud you say   
TG: inchwise   
TG: i dunno like 4 or so   
TG: about halfway   
TG: HOLPY SHIT u have an 8 inhc dick?????   
TG: oh my god what no   
TG: that wasnt what i   
TG: oh my fucking god i cant do this   
TG: dave shut up and sit ur ass back down   
TG: look i RLY dont care if you have a huge penis davey it dosent matter to me at all   
TG: this is the most horrible conversation ive ever had   
TG: SIGH   
TG: well if ull stop ur bellyacne for 2 sec im pretty sure i know what ur problem is   
TG: what is it   
TG: was it her first time doin anal   
TG: yeah   
TG: like with anything more than fingers i guess   
TG: well ok wat it probably is is her sgmaoid   
TG: what   
TG: *sigmadi   
TG: *sgimoid   
TG: *sigmoid   
TG: what   
TG: ok well u know how ur have ur rectum   
TG: yeah   
TG: ya the rectum isnt as deep as ud think is only about 3-4 in of ur actual intestnal tract   
TG: past the rectum is the sagamiod colon   
TG: an basicaly theres a valve between the two that closes so feces does nt descend into ur rectum unitil ur actually reaady to poop   
TG: keeps tha bullet out of the champber so to speak   
TG: now ther s two things that could b goin on here   
TG: 1) she could just have a tense sigmaod valve   
TG: 2) she could have a rly sharp and infalexibble bend from the rectum 2 the sigamode thqat ur runnin into   
TG: and u CAN straiten that out a bit w/ some training the puborectal sling but taht takes a while and u nneed 2 b really careful with her   
TG: the valve itself is a bi t easier 2 deal with   
TG: waht u should do is rim her 4 a whiel so shes rly relaxed the muscles in there   
TG: and get a thin toy lube d up REAL good   
TG: dont force it or nethin   
TG: an just kind of ease it agenst the valve   
TG: gentle but firm   
TG: if u can get it open u can move up to progressvelay thikcer objects an eventually youre penis   
TG: w/ enough practice she should be able to relax it on her own laeter   
TG: its rly basicly just like a seconf sphincter you have to work at its the same deal as the first only its way up there   
TG: huh   
TG: ok   
TG: i guess well try that   
TG: thanks mom   
TG: dont lose hope baby   
TG: ur stepfather had the same probelem but we worked through it :)   
TG: oh my FUCKING god   
TG: ajhfjfsfjsdn

turntechGodhead [TG] ceased pestering tipsyGnostalgic [TG]


	9. Chapter 9

Tick. Tock.

You imagine the sound as you stare into the glowing green light of the digital timer on your stove from your seat at the kitchen island.

You take a drink.

There are five minutes exactly until Dirk is scheduled to arrive at your apartment. You've done everything you can and are as ready as you could possibly be, which is currently completely fucking unprepared. Your hand has a slight tremor as you flex your fingers around the glass of whiskey in your hand.

You take a drink.

You don't _want_ to be drunk, but your nerves are fucking killing you. You feel like you're going to explode from the anticipation and the anxiety and you have so many reasons to want to back out but some part of your reptile brain won't let you listen to any of them.

So you take a drink. 

You practically jump out of your skin when you hear a two-minutes-early rap on the door. After dropping down from your seat, you hurry over to the entranceway of the apartment. All that stands between you and him is that slim plank of wood.

You look down at the empty glass still in your hand and wish you had another drink. 

With a deep breath, your hand closes around the handle of the door. You pull it open. There he stands, dressed in the same stupid fucking outfit he always wears. That such a ridiculous caricature of a man manages to inspire such genuine intimidation in you never ceases to astound you.

"Hey," he says, tone absent any of the anxiety currently suffocating you utterly.

"Hey," you echo. You do your fucking best to be as chill about it as he is, but you're sure it's a laughable effort.

If he notices your discomfort, he doesn't mention it; Dirk pushes past you into the apartment and you shakily close the door behind him.

"Do you want a drink?" you ask without thinking, gesturing with your glass. He turns back to you and quirks an eyebrow wordlessly; not only have you forgotten he's a neurotic control freak, your glass is empty. "Oh."

You awkwardly move to the kitchen and set the glass aside on the island. You try to clear your throat when you look back to him. Your mouth is very dry.

"Did you bring condoms?" you ask tensely. You have them, but you'd hope he'd at least exercise some measure of responsibility after the last time.

You have no idea what possessed you to entertain such a delusion.

"No," Dirk answers, completely even and without anything resembling contrite. You stare at him blankly, willing a hole to spontaneously burn itself into his forehead. "You made such a big deal over it last time I knew you'd buy them yourself, so why waste my own cash? Not necessary," he clarifies after a tense stand-off.

"But —"

"You did get some, didn't you?"

"... Yeah," you pitifully concede.

"There we go. Now are we gonna fuck or not?" he brashly asks, staring at you expectantly in a way that manages to make you even more discomforted than you already are.

"Uh... yeah." You take a moment to fidget uncomfortably before attempting something resembling a confident stride towards your bedroom. Dirk trails not far behind you.

You push open the half-closed door to the master bedroom; it's a spacious affair, just like the rest of the apartment, with the same system of floor-to-ceiling windows stretching across the western wall. A pair of glass doors open up into a small private terrace overlooking the city far below — Dirk stops to admire the view once he's followed you inside. "Like what you've done with the place," he drawls.

You don't know what to say to that. You take a moment to open and close your mouth nervously as he stares out into the night skyline; eventually you give up and sit down on the edge of your bed and begin the process of shakily removing your clothing. You start with your socks. It's surprisingly difficult.

You freeze in your place, your second sock half-off, when Dirk abruptly turns back around to stare at you. "... What?" you uneasily ask.

"The fuck are you so piss scared of?"

"I'm not _scared,_ " you protest. It'll even be true as soon as the alcohol properly kicks in. Any minute now.

"Bullshit. You look like some quivering twelve year old girl lined up for a communal deflowering in a back alley."

"I —"

"Your ass ain't fuckin' gonna split in two, taking the dick isn't gonna mean you're _married_ to me, and the incest bullshit matters to precisely no one. Calm the fuck down."

"You're not exactly helping my nerves any by yelling at me or using creepy child gang rape analogies."

"I'm not yelling at you. This is a perfectly normal indoor voice."

"No, you're just berating me and treating me like a little kid, which is worse."

"If you don't want to be treated like a little kid, stop acting like one. I ain't a fucking pedo, I came here to stick my dick in a _man,_ " he says, hands moving to the buckle of his belt. "So buck up, settle down and take off your fucking pants."

You gawk at him, but in the end you don't fucking have the energy to argue. You just want to get this over with, so you take off your fucking pants.

Dirk is quick to discard his own clothing; he starts with his belt, then his shoes, then his hat — he wanders over to your bedside table to set it and his shades aside, not taking his eyes off you for a moment. You realize you forgot to wear your shades and are struck with such self-conscious worry that you're liable to burst — you're so disarmed by his piercing stare and the crippling weight of your own pointless neurosis that you don't even notice you've frozen up. 

Despite your inaction, you seem to have won a reprieve from his castigations. You just sit there with your rapidly burgeoning semi in your briefs and tee as you watch him disrobe. He peels off his shirt and casts it aside; you wet your lips as his hands move to unzip his pants. You almost laugh when his jeans drop around his ankles to reveal his startlingly orange boxers, but the look he gives you makes you think better of it.

You reflexively shift away from him as he slowly and predatorily climbs onto the mattress of the bed. You swallow, but that doesn't stop your rapidly beating heart from feeling like it's lodged in your throat. He crawls towards you, over you — he's not touching you but you can feel the heat of his body above you, your eyes wide and disarmed and not at all ready for any of this shit.

He kisses you. You close your eyes tight and do your best to relax into his lips, though your best is a pretty shoddy effort. You're even a little buzzed at this point, but it doesn't help much. He moves against you fluidly, his hand trailing up your side to hike up your shirt and push it up over your head. You break from the kiss to shift awkwardly and assist in the effort to rid yourself of the bothersome article, but he's back upon you the moment he tosses the shirt off to the floor.

Despite your nerves, your dick seems to have been more than enthusiastic enough for the both of you. Your breath hitches in your throat as he grinds his crotch against yours; you're already practically completely hard at this point, and your desperation is steadily building to match.

"At least _he's_ happy to be here," Dirk muses — and you don't know if it's the booze or the infuriating punchability of his smug fucking mug, but you're overcome by a inexplicable fervor and eagerly wipe the smirk off his face with your lips.

You push him off and then back down onto the bed, pressing your body against his as you savagely attack his mouth with your lips and teeth and tongue. He laughs against you, evidently supremely amused by your newfound aggression, and snakes his arm around to fist his fingers in your hair. He gives as good as he gets and before long it's clearly apparent he has you outmatched — you're panting into his mouth and erratically thrusting against his hip and practically _trembling_ from the lust and he's still the cool fucking customer who doesn't give a shit about anything, least of all you. Every moment you spend without him inside you is fucking _torture_.

"God, please," you mumble incoherently, palming at his junk through his shorts. Dirk just snorts at you.

"I'm no fifteen year old boy anymore, you're gonna have to wait a minute or two for the thing to get up."

"Let me suck you off," you beg, sounding considerably more pathetic and desperate than you intended. He looks at you like you're nuts.

"Ain't like you gotta ask, dude, be my guest."

You kiss him one last time before you shift your way down his body. He settles into a comfortable position and leaves you to it, watching you expectantly. You try your best not to feel scrutinized and self-conscious as you get him out of his boxers. 

If there's one thing you've missed in your decade of self-imposed heterosexuality, it is sucking dick. Just about everything else you could get from the ladies, but there isn't really a proper substitute for a cock in the mouth. You like the way it tastes and smells and feels on your tongue, and just the act of doing it gives you a rush and a sense of power that nothing else really matches.

So you're kind of a reckless moron. You still trust Dirk just about as far as you can throw him, but you hate the taste of latex and you want to taste his skin and cum bare against your tongue — you're stupid, but you're also a little drunk, horny as fuck and afflicted with an insatiable cocklust that overrides your sensible desire to not end up probably contracting every oral disease known to man. You're probably not impaired enough to reasonably blame it for your bad decisions, but hell if that's going to stop you from shirking all responsibility for your actions in the morning.

He's still mostly soft when you take him into your mouth. You're able to get it in all the way like this, which you imagine won't last for long — you're quick to set to work, lathering his cock with your tongue. Dirk lets loose a contented sigh and shifts beneath you.

You can feel his cock expanding in your mouth as you suck; each time your head bobs down back towards the base, the less of it you're able to take inside. You curl your fist around his shaft as soon as you have the room, and it's not long until your hand's covering considerably more ground than your mouth — you pump him quickly in time with the motions of your head and tongue, savoring the taste of him in your mouth and the sound of his quickening breath above you.

Not only has he grown long, but the girth of his cock is making it increasingly difficult to fit much of any of him in your mouth. You push down as far as you can take each time, but by the thickest part of the shaft it's too difficult to work past your teeth without scraping his skin. You get lost in what you can manage all the same, moaning softly around his dick as you lick and suck hungrily at the head.

Your own cock strains in your briefs, even the slightest of brushes against the sheets of the bed below you sending jolts of heightened pleasure and redoubled desperation through your body. You want to get off so fucking bad but you don't want to stop sucking him off either — your free hand wanders its way down your junk, but the moment you grip the bulge in your pants in your palm he interrupts you.

"Think that's enough, yeah?" he says, and you stop to look up at him like a deer caught in the headlights. _Fuck._

"Yeah," you say, slowly sitting back up. You can't not stare at his dick. It's _massive._ "I, uh... yeah, I guess it is. God, it fucking better be."

"Come here."

You look back up to him and hesitate for a moment before complying uneasily. You crawl up alongside him, worrying your lip with your teeth when you're back face to face — he pushes against your shoulder and rolls you over onto the bed. You look between him and his hard dick looming over you and swallow.

You _really_ fucking wish you had another drink.

"Get these off," he says as he hooks his fingers in the waistband of your briefs and begins to tug down. You lift your hips to assist and he pulls them down and off your legs, throwing them to the floor with the rest of your discarded clothing. The air feels chilly against the precum streaked on the head of your cock.

"I, uh. I prepped before you got here, some," you blabber inarticulately. You spent a good bit of time with your dildo and a spatula and the handle of a toilet plunger and a whole lot of other objects that had absolutely no business being in your ass, long enough for you to be reasonably confident you'll be able to at least accommodate his dick lengthwise. 

"Good boy," Dirk practically purrs, and you feel more validated than is probably warranted. "Where're your rubbers?"

"In the bedside table. The drawer."

Dirk crawls over you to reach the drawer, pulls it open and begins to blindly root around. You inwardly wince as you hear the objects inside being knocked into disarray. When he draws back, he's got a wrapper and your lube in his hand.

You spread your legs a little and the action makes you feel so overwhelmingly mortified and shy. After momentarily setting the items aside, Dirk pushes back your knees and presses his fingers against you, rubbing in a slow circle.

"You don't have to — just — just put it in. I got ready," you breathe. You're so fucking anxious to just _do it_ already, you can barely stand another second — but Dirk gives you nothing but a condescending smirk.

"Nothing you could've done in one night is gonna make you _ready_ for this thing."

"Shut up, you conceited dick. Holy shit."

"Ain't bragging," he evenly says. He retrieves the lube, uncaps it and begins to spread it onto his fingers. "My cock ain't exactly virgin friendly."

"I'm not a _virgin._ "

"You know what I meant, dipshit. Besides, you've half dried out, I have to relube you anyway. That shit doesn't last forever."

"It still _feels_ plenty —"

"Look, if you don't want me to bust you in half, shut up," he says, and jams his fingers up your ass.

You breathe in sharply at the sudden intrusion, but settle back and do your best to relax. Your neglected cock throbs and leaks against your stomach and you can't help but squirm as he steadily works into you — he's quick to add a third finger, and your earlier preparation at least pays forward with minimal discomfort. He drives his fingers in and scissors them out methodically, working for efficiency more than your pleasure, and from the flush of his face you can surmise he's as eager to get to it as you are. He still takes his time, though, a fact which grows increasingly tortuous with each passing second.

"Just _do_ it," you hiss, and for once he actually complies.

He pulls his fingers out and grabs the condom up from where he'd left it on the bed, tears open the wrapper, and draws back to roll it down his hard cock.

"All right," he says, adding another liberal application of lubricant to his dick. "You ready to go?"

You fidget. You're buzzed and going out of your mind with lust, and the sight of it and the reality of him being inside of you still intimidate the fuck out of you. You do your best to push that aside, take a deep breath, and say, "Yeah. I guess."

Dirk moves into position and you prepare yourself, tense as hell despite your best efforts to relax. He takes hold of his cock in his hand, and you stare rapt between your own legs as he presses the head against you and slowly begins to push inside.

You bite down on your lip as he breaches you, an enormous pressure building inside of you as he stretches the ring of muscle well past the extent of your prior preparation. Even just his dick at the head is considerably thicker than either his fingers or the dildo you were using, and you rapidly discover that his conceited self-aggrandizement was distressingly well-founded.

He takes it painfully slow, pressing in just an inch or two before he pulls back to start it all over again. He pushes in just a little more each time — and every time you feel you're stretched past your limit, he sinks further in to prove you wrong again. It hurts, and the way he fucking _teases_ you with it doesn't help — he pulls all the way out every time, like he doesn't _want_ you to acclimate, like he wants to force you to feel how big he is every single time and never fucking forget it. You feel you're well acquainted with that fact as this point, so it's grown a bit tiresome.

After what feels like near on an eternity, Dirk's managed to get his dick sheathed halfway inside. When he doesn't seem to be able to progress any further than that, you begin to worry — you were pretty sure that you prepped well enough, but is his cock too thick? Dirk soon deigns to interrupt your fretting.

"Relax," he chides, as if it were supposed to be the easiest fucking thing in the world.

"I _am_ relaxed," you spit back. You like to think you're about as relaxed as anyone could possibly be in your situation, at least.

"No you aren't."

"Fu—"

Your protest is silenced when Dirk leans down and presses his lips against yours. You exhale in a heavy gust before leaning up into him; he moves, kissing you slowly and gently and with surprisingly little tongue. "Shh," he hushes you, and kisses you again. "Shhhhhut the fuck up."

You breathe out and wrap an arm around his neck, pulling him down closer to you on the bed. You close your eyes and do your best to let go of the tension, to steady the erratic pace of your breath, to just focus on the sensation of his lips moving against yours.

Before you realize what's happened you feel his hips connect with the back of your thighs. You suck in a sharp breath when you push him back to look between you.

"There we go," he declares triumphantly. You see that he did, indeed, get it all the way in.

"Okay," you mumble, shifting uneasily as you attempt to acclimate yourself to the feeling of his girth inside of you. It doesn't seem to get any easier. "Okay."

"Yeah." Dirk leans down and catches your lips between his again, and as soon as you connect you feel him slowly start to drag himself back out.

You have to break away and curse; it feels like you're being fucking pulled inside out, even with the more than abundant lubrication. "Jesus, _God,_ it's fucking — _fuck,_ you're _enormous,_ " you babble, half your words probably unintelligible over your gasping breaths.

"I know," Dirk replies with an irritatingly smug laugh. There's a massive relief when he pulls his cock all the way out, but that's crushed by its subsequent reentry that's not any less daunting than the first time. You grip onto the arms braced at either side of you and dig your blunt fingernails into into his flesh, grit your teeth painfully, and bite at his lips angrily when he sinks all the way back in and leans down to meet yours again.

Dirk repositions his weight to his forearms until his body is leaned more fully over yours, shifting your legs until your knees are pressed back. He licks into your mouth as he starts to move again, in shallower strokes, but you can't manage much of an oral reciprocation when you're forced to inhale or exhale with tremendous force every time he fucking moves.

The greatest bulk of the pain begins to subside once he's had a bit of time to move and really spread the around the lube, but it never stops being so disarmingly fucking _present_. Every little movement inside of you may as well be a fucking earthquake; it's like he's filled twice as much of your abdomen as you logically know he has. You feel such a heavy weight against your spine, in your stomach; you half expect the thing to come up out of your mouth.

Just as soon as you feel that _maybe_ you're getting used to it, that you can focus on the oblique sensation of his cock brushing against your prostate more than the overwhelming feeling of being stuffed full of way too much dick, he's pulled back and out of you again.

"What are y—"

"C'mere," he says as he settles down onto the bed beside you. He wraps an arm around you and pulls your back against his chest, his cock flush and throbbing against your ass. "Here, hold up your leg."

You quickly comply, turning your head to look to him inquisitively. He nips at your lips as he repositions his cock at your entrance and guides himself back inside. 

It's a shallower angle, but that's a bit easier for you to handle. He gradually builds a steady rhythm, thrusting slowly into you as his hand strokes up and down the length of your stomach and chest, stopping to rub and pinch your nipples. You shift your body a bit so that you can lean your leg against his hip and turn your head to kiss him. You're getting used to this. You might actually be beginning to enjoy it.

You're definitely beginning to enjoy it when his hand wraps around your cock and he aims a targeted thrust directly against your prostate. You bite back a yelp the first time, but as he hits it again and again and again, pumping your dick in his fist in time with his quickening pace, it grows harder to hold back.

You kiss him needily just to shut yourself up, but it's not the most effective strategy. You gasp and pant, rocking your hips down onto his dick and up into his fist, too desperate to maintain any coherent pace.

"Tell me you want me," Dirk pants against your lips as he thrusts up into you. Your breath catches in your throat and you can barely articulate a reply.

"Fffuck, yes," you gasp. "I want —" You kiss him desperately. "So fucking bad, I —" You cry out as he snaps up his hips again, driving into you as deep as he can go.

You just fucking let loose. You're not normally so fucking _vocal_ but that thing is _killing_ you up there, and every labored moan he pulls from you seems to inspire him to thrust up into you even more quickly, even harder, and he never fails to hit that right spot even once. You throw your head back against the sheets and _keen_.

"Fffuck, fuck, fuck fuck God _fuck_ ," you chant as he fucks you nearly senseless. At some point in your delirium, you make an interesting choice of words: you don't think to cry out his _name,_ no — instead you moan, "Mmnnffuck, bro —"

And Dirk fucking _growls_. "Call me that again."

So you do. You say it again and again and again and again, practically fucking _begging_ him to fuck you, and it's not just that it's _him_ , it's that he's your _brother_ and you know it and you're getting off on it so fucking bad — and he rewards you with a brutally hard thrust every time, savagely biting and sucking at your lips until they're raw and swollen and split. Then he flips you over, pushing your body into the bed with the weight of his own, and wastes no time returning to his efforts; he slams into you from behind time and time again until you're reduced to little more than a writhing heap, practically fucking _weeping_ beneath him. He rams into your prostate with every thrust, snaps into you so quickly that the sensations run into a blur, and fisting your hands in the sheets of the bed with your face pushed down into the mattress is all you can do to hold on for dear life.

The reprieve of depth you had in the last position is all gone now, and he's forcing you to take every last inch of his dick. You can feel him so deep inside of you and he's stretching you so wide that it _sears,_ but you've reached a point where you can scarcely register anything as anything other than pleasure. As deep as he goes and as thick as he is you want _more,_ and you push back up into him feverishly, panting and drooling freely onto the sheets. He bites your shoulder and you bite your lip just as hard and the feeling of that little bit of your own blood seeping into your mouth incenses you.

He doesn't falter for a second as he reaches an arm around to shift up your hips, forcing you to support your weight on your spread and quavering knees. There he has just enough room to fit his hand between your body and the bed and take your cock back into his fist, jerking you off in time with his thrusts. You're nearing your peak now, and Dirk thankfully seems to have elected to not be as enormous of a bastard as he could be — he works you hard, strokes you in just the way you like to be touched because it's his too, and it's not long before he pushes you over the edge into a powerful orgasm that courses through your body and leaves you trembling and breathless.

He pulls out after you've thoroughly come and he's worked out every last drop of you into his fist. Completely fucking exhausted, you just collapse onto the bed, your chest heaving erratically as you just begin to come down from the high. You can't even fucking begin to process what just happened.

You roll over onto your back as soon as enough of your mental faculties have returned for basic motor control. You notice Dirk has made his way over to the wastebasket and is in the process of disposing of the condom; he's still completely, ragingly erect, so you surmise he hasn't gotten off. You uneasily sit up, more than a little sore — he turns and moves back towards the bed, slowly stroking himself in his cum-covered fist.

"C'mere," he says, beckoning you with his free hand. You're not sure exactly what he wants, so you hesitate.

"What?"

Dirk casts a glance down to the floor in front of him. "On your knees."

 _Oh._ You pause for a moment before complying; your muscles feel weak and everything between your legs is so oddly numb, and if you hadn't intended to kneel before him, you imagine you would've collapsed if you'd tried to take a step anyway. Dirk immediately positions himself over you and begins to jack himself off in earnest — you brace your hands on his thighs, close your eyes, open your mouth and wait.

What feels like a blind eternity passes, with nothing more than the sound of Dirk beating his meat filling the silence. You open your eyes for a moment to see what the fuck is taking him so long and —

Dirk chooses that exact moment to bust his nut directly into your eye.

"FUCK," you all but scream as burning pain erupts in your eye. You immediately bring up your hands to shield your face and rub at your eye, which only makes it worse. "Jesus _fuck,_ you fucking jizzed in my _eye,_ holy _shit_ —"

He helpfully deposits another rope of semen onto the back of your hands.

You get up and make some sort of blind and pathetically hobbled attempt to run to the bathroom; you collide with the doorframe and bang your knee and erupt into a droning chant of _fuck fuck fuck fuck fuck fuck fuck_ until you make it to the shower, turn on the showerhead full blast and jump in without closing the stall door behind you.

"You're so fucking dramatic," Dirk laughs from nearby; he'd evidently followed you into the bathroom. You'd have to stop running water over your eye to glare at him so you don't, but you wish him pain.

"Fucking dick."

He steps in behind you and closes the door, sparing your bathroom floor the worst of the puddles. "Mhmm," he hums. He slips his arms around your waist and generally sets about being a nuisance, kissing the back of your neck and letting his hands wander places you'd rather they not. 

You twist around in his arms once the pain has subsided enough for you to properly bitch him out. His hands immediately settle on your behind, like some sort of bizarre ass grabbing reflex. "You could have warn—"

"Hahaha, christ, you look like you have fucking pinkeye," he interrupts you, sniggering unrepentant at his handiwork. You groan, elbow him in the chest and turn to shove your face back into the shower stream.

Washing up is a rather protracted affair, given how many times Dirk decides to interrupt whatever you're doing to make out. Eventually, though, you manage to succeed in washing your hair and ridding your body of all of the sweat, spunk and lube residue. Dirk is especially eager to assist you in cleaning downstairs.

Once you've finished, you keep your jizz-eye squeezed shut as you turn off the shower, dry off and wrap a towel around your waist. Dirk lazily follows suit, trailing you back into the bedroom to join you in your effort to retrieve the clothing haphazardly strewn about the floor. He begins to redress as soon as he's gathered his things — he's in the process of pulling back on his pants when you make what is probably another terrible decision. "You can stay, if you want," you remark with controlled nonchalance as you drop your dirty clothes into the laundry basket near the closet.

Dirk pauses mid-zip, his expression one of measured scrutiny. "You sure?" he asks. There's an edge of suspicion in his voice you can't place.

"Yeah. It's been a while since I slept in the same bed with another person while I wasn't blackout fucking drunk, so, you know, why not," you say with a shrug, in a carefully contrived effort to make it seem like you don't give half as much a shit about him as you do.

"... All right."

Even after the sex and the extended shower, it's still pretty early, but you're so mentally and physically wiped out that you figure you may as well go to bed anyway. "Going to sleep," you blithely announce as you drop your towel and collapse onto the mattress, burying your face in your pillow. You feel the bed sink as Dirk crawls onto it not long after. He covers both your bodies with the sheets once he's settled in besides you, and thus begins your harrowing effort to think about anything but the consequences of what you've just done.


	10. Chapter 10

You're not the least bit surprised when sleeping proves to be impossible.

Dirk conks out within practically no time at all, but an hour passes, and then two, and then three, then six, and you're still wide fucking awake as the circus spins around in your head and snuffs out any fantasy you might have had about getting some actual rest. You lay there listlessly, exhausted but unable to will your eyes shut — you stare over at the dark silhouette of his sleeping form and wonder what the fuck possessed you to be so fucking stupid.

You eventually come to terms with the fact that you're not going to get to sleep. In an effort to stave away the specter of boredom that rapidly descends upon you, you carefully roll over and reach over to the bedside table to grab your phone from where you'd left it. After glancing back to verify that Dirk hadn't been disturbed, you set about pestering your poor sister.

turntechGodhead [TG] began pestering tentacleTherapist [TT]

TG: yo sis  
TG: guess what i just did  
TG: or who  
TG: or what to whom  
TG: or i guess  
TG: by whom  
TG: since i guess it was basically me getting a whole lot of what done to me  
TG: its implicit that the what is sex  
TG: ok let me start over  
TG: guess who i just let make a gay in my ass  
TG: the guessing is rhetorical i dont actually want you to guess im just going to list the reasons i am a fucking dumbass  
TG: he is 13 years older than me  
TG: he owns a website where he performs sexual acts with puppets on camera  
TG: he has created an incredibly shitty porn parody of every movie i have been connected to in the past 10 years  
TG: he basically runs an online shrine to my lips  
TG: the only reason we even fucking met is because he followed me into the bathroom of an awards party im pretty fucking positive he was not invited to  
TG: basically hes been stalking me for god knows how long  
TG: also hes a complete fucking dick who doesnt give anything approaching a shit about me or my feelings about anything  
TG: oh and did i mention he is my biological brother  
TG: like this wasnt some wacky misunderstanding  
TG: he knew about it all along and deliberately didnt tell me  
TG: im pretty sure this is some fetish thing for him  
TG: so anyway i tallied all that up and decided  
TG: yup  
TG: time to spread my legs and take it  
TG: this is the perfect man to trust to dick me  
TG: flawless fucking judgment call  
TG: and hes still here  
TG: like im letting him stay because that couldnt fucking possibly end badly  
TG: im writing you this fucking novel on my phone while hes right here asleep and i turned the sound off because i am nothing if not a courteous ass motherfucker  
TG: brotherfucker w/e  
TG: i literally had sexual intercourse with my brother rose  
TG: rose  
TG: rose  
TG: rose  
TG: god damn its like 7 am for you over there get up   
TT: Heavens, I just woke up.  
TT: Give me a minute to read this imposing wall of text you've so generously deposited onto my screen, will you?   
TG: dont even read it tl;dr im dumb   
TT: It's too late. I read it.  
TT: You're dumb.   
TG: thanks  
TG: he jizzed in my eye and laughed at me   
TT: ...  
TT: So why, exactly, are you with this guy?   
TG: dude i was hoping you could tell me  
TG: cause logically i acknowledge this guy is a total piece of shit  
TG: and yet  
TG: here i am  
TG: with his creepy stalker ass in my bed   
TT: Is it a nice ass, at least?   
TG: god yes   
TT: It's as I thought.   
TG: what   
TT: You have a penis.  
TT: Sorry, it's terminal.   
TG: ha ha hilarious sis good one   
TT: But, seriously,  
TT: May I suggest not letting your dick do your thinking in your brain's stead?   
TG: easier said than done   
TT: Mhmm.  
TT: You are aware that incest is a felony crime, right?   
TG: what   
TT: As in, you would be sent to prison if anyone found out?   
TG: are you serious  
TG: i thought that was just for like  
TG: fucking your kids and shit   
TT: Nope.   
TG: what the fuck  
TG: i could seriously be sent to the slammer for fucking my adult brother   
TT: In the state of California, potentially.   
TG: im 32 fucking years old  
TG: why the hell does the state care if i fuck my brother  
TG: thanks now im shitting my pants   
TT: I assumed you knew.  
TT: I could have told you this if you informed me of your intentions to go through with it before you actually did it.   
TG: oh this is fucking rich  
TG: youre constantly bitching about me telling you too much about my sex life  
TG: and the one time i dont give you a comprehensive play by play  
TG: OH DAVE IF ONLY YOUD BEEN A LITTLE MORE THOROUGH  
TG: should i text you while im doing it next time  
TG: walk you through it while he lubes me up   
TT: Dave.   
TG: let you know by exactly how many degrees he turns his fingers around in my butt   
TT: Dave.   
TG: measure out the exact depth of my rectum so your double brother ass fantasies are as verisimilitudinous as possible   
TT: Dave.   
TG: what rose  
TG: what   
TT: I do not want to know anything about your butt, or the things that happen in or around it.  
TT: Or your penis, for that matter, or what you do with your mouth or hands to or with anyone else's genitals.   
TG: does that mean footjobs are ok to talk about   
TT: Or feet.  
TT: Let's just rule out any contact with any part of your body to any erogenous zone on any person whatsoever.   
TG: what about my  
TG: dammit   
TT: I am, however, perfectly willing to discuss your relationships.  
TT: What I object to is you messaging me at three in the morning to tell me you think you tore your frenulum while masturbating.   
TG: but that fucking hurt so bad   
TT: And that's exactly why you should have told a doctor, and not me, a person with neither the qualifications nor the desire to deal with such an issue.   
TG: you dont really need qualifications to tell if a dick is torn or not   
TT: Then why the hell did you ask me if it was?  
TT: Were you rendered blind that night from the profligate sins of your self-pleasure?   
TG: its always a good idea to get a second opinion   
TT: You're just doing this to annoy me, aren't you.   
TG: yeah pretty much

"The fuck you laughin' about?"

You immediately freeze up at the sound of Dirk's voice. Shit, you woke him up.

"Uh, nothing, just talking to my sis—"

And just like that, Dirk wrests your phone from your hands and begins to read off the scrollback. Mortified, you make a futile attempt at retrieving it, clawing over him and grabbing for it, but he eventually pushes you off and pins you down as he gleefully gloats over his victory.

"You have so many nice things to say about me," he sweetly remarks, thumbing across the screen. 

"Fuck off," you reply, your face burning red in embarrassment. You claw weakly at the forearm currently pressed across your chest and shoulders, but that doesn't deter him from keeping you immobilized.

"Your sister's tart. I like her."

"You would."

And apparently, he does, because he begins actually typing something out onto the phone.

"Holy fuck, no, don't _talk_ to her," you hiss, redoubling your efforts to free yourself from his grasp. Unfortunately, he's significantly stronger than you are and you're pretty much fucked.

"It's a free country."

"That's my phone!"

"I'll give it back when I'm done."

You nervously glance at the screen. You can't read it from your position, but you can see that extra purple lines are popping up in the window. "Oh god, what are you _saying?_ "

"Chill out," Dirk dismisses you. "We're just having a friendly chat."

Resigned to the fact that there's no way you're going to fight him off, you give up and settle into a tense silence as you stare at Dirk and the hand quickly texting on your phone. All you can go is sit in horrified embarrassment as he gives you that smug fucking smirk.

Eventually he seems to have his fill of being a shit, releases you, and drops your phone back into your hands. "Here," he yawns. "I'm goin' back to sleep. Try to keep it down this time." You immediately scroll up to assess the damage.

TT: I am truly blessed to have such a wonderful brother.   
TG: I don't know about that.   
TT: Given the likelihood of Dave being stricken with a desire to communicate with proper syntax are about as low as I could estimate anything to be, I take it his delightful partner currently has custody of his phone?   
TG: Yeah.  
TG: I'm just reading through him bitching about me.  
TG: What a whiner.   
TT: Is what he said not true?   
TG: Nah, it's true.  
TG: I mean, that not how I'd put it, but the facts aren't wrong.   
TT: I see.   
TG: I like your books.   
TT: Is that so?   
TG: Yeah.  
TG: They're good.  
TG: Dense, but thematic, and you've got a strong grasp of characterization and narrative recursion.  
TG: Tough read. You don't baby your audience. I respect that.   
TT: Thank you.  
TT: Dave showed me the script you wrote. You're a rather accomplished author yourself.   
TG: Nah. I just wrote that shit 'cause I wanted to get into his pants.   
TT: ...  
TT: Well, that's certainly charming.   
TG: I ain't gonna pretend it's not good, because it obviously is, but I wouldn't call myself an author.  
TG: Writing is just one of the many things I'm fucking great at, which is basically everything more or less?  
TG: I'm sort of a genius.  
TG: Not to toot my own horn or anything.   
TT: Oh, of course, that kind of self-congratulatory behavior would be utterly unconscionable.    
TG: Yeah, you know how it is.  
TG: Ok, baby wants his phone back. I'm gonna hand it over before he bursts into little bitch tears.   
TT: It was... nice talking to you.  
TT: I guess.   
TG: Likewise.

You cringe. Jesus _Christ,_ he is a cock — you quickly begin to type a flustered apology.

TG: i am so fucking sorry   
TT: Your brother is certainly a colorful character.   
TG: no hes a fucking douche   
TT: Yes, that was what I was getting at with that.   
TG: half the time i cant fucking stand him   
TT: He seems like one of those people who would be very entertaining to observe from a distance, and phenomenally unpleasant to have as an actual acquaintance.   
TG: yeah something like that   
TT: I thought you'd learned your lesson about dating sadistic narcissists.   
TG: ok he is nowhere NEAR as bad as meenah   
TT: Are you sure?  
TT: I'm sensing a Type being established here.   
TG: no way  
TG: ok dirk is like 70% narcissist 30% sadist  
TG: whereas meenah is 10% narcissist 90% sadist  
TG: like not that she isnt also a magnificent fucking narcissist too its just dwarfed by her insatiable desire to destroy the lives of everyone she meets  
TG: dirk just wants me to give his ego a blowjob constantly its not as bad  
TG: or just like normal blowjobs  
TG: hes a really penis focused guy   
TT: Yes, what you are describing sounds positively wonderful.   
TG: no its terrible im just saying meenah is worse   
TT: If you say so.   
TG: ok hold that thought i gotta piss like a racehorse

You make an attempt to quietly slip out of bed, but the moment your feet connect with the floor and you move to stand you become critically aware of what is a distressingly unignorable pain in your ass. It hurt a little before you got up, but you figured that was normal — this is something else.

"Holy shit," you curse, immediately dropping back onto the mattress. "My ass fucking _kills,_ the fuck did you _do_ to me?"

Dirk sits up to loom over you with a condescendingly quirked brow. "Well, if I had to guess I'd say I probably put my dick in your ass."

" _Fuck,_ " you growl. You roll into a ball curled up on your side. "I feel like I just blasted out a gallon of horrible burning Mexishits."

"Yeah. You were way too tight, you needed a lot more long term prep before I could've fucked you without half splitting you apart."

You roll over to glare at him vindictively. "Then why the hell did you fuck me if you knew that?"

Dirk shrugs, blithely disregarding your discomfort. "You'll do it again, now, 'cause you've already done it. If I'd waited any longer you might've pussied out of the whole deal, thinkin' you could get out with some of your innocence intact if you hadn't already taken the full dick. I'm just looking out for my long term interests."

Your lip curls into an incredulous sneer. "Jesus, you — what's stopping me from pulling out now? You being a _tremendous fucking cock_ is just as good a reason to end it as —"

"Nah, you'll do it again. You want it too much not to," he says, lazy and matter-of-fact. He makes a show of rolling over and returning to sleep, clearly indicating that the conversation has ended.

"You —"

Your attempted castigations are cut off when Dirk lets loose a loud, exaggerated snore. You groan histrionically and force yourself out of bed — you still need to piss really bad, and if you spend one more second next to him you're liable to throttle him. You hobble your way over to the bathroom, doing your best to stomp angrily in spite of your crippled gate. You bring your phone with you, and continue your previous conversation with Rose.

TG: rose i think he broke my ass   
TT: ... Dave, what did I JUST tell you?   
TG: dude its so much worse than it was last night  
TG: i seriously cant even walk   
TT: For fuck's sake.   
TG: well i can walk  
TG: it just sucks   
TT: What do you expect me to do about it?   
TG: nothing  
TG: god cant a guy tell his sister about his buttfuck pains without a whole bunch of sturm and drang   
TT: No.  
TT: Dave, I am leaving.  
TT: I am physically getting up and walking away from my computer.   
TG: oh thats cool  
TG: im taking a piss right now  
TG: ugghh i think i had some jizz blocked up in my pisshole or something the stream was spraying around  
TG: i got pee on the walls but fuck if i can be assed to clean it up with this rump rumpus ive got going on right now  
TG: im gonna have to leave it like that  
TG: pissy walls  
TG: its gonna smell like shit for days  
TG: god damn i hadnt even considered how im gonna shit  
TG: i mean i did an enema just yesterday evening so itll be a while before i have to go again  
TG: but its gonna happen eventually  
TG: i dunno if i actually tore my ass or if its just stretched out and sore or what  
TG: idk maybe the shitll just fall out of my cavernous used up ass and i wont even notice it  
TG: are you still there  
TG: no  
TG: ok  
TG: thats fine  
TG: its cool  
TG: ill talk to you later i guess  
TG: peace

turntechGodhead [TG] began pestering tentacleTherapist [TT]

You give your wiener a good shake once you finish off and flush the toilet. As you limp over to the sink to wash your hands you catch a glimpse of yourself in the mirror and almost laugh — your hair is a complete fucking mess, frizzy and sticking up at odd angles. The bite mark on your shoulder has already begun to bruise a sickly mottled color, and your lips are decidedly swollen and split. With a sigh, you set your phone aside on the counter and rinse your hands in the sink.

Once you're done, you take your phone and your beaten up ass and shamble back to the bed. Dirk is still and breathing evenly, his back turned to you; you don't know if he's gotten back to sleep already, but you don't disturb him. You crawl back under the sheets beside him and try your best to actually get some rest.

 

***

 

You wake up at 1:00 PM and find Dirk gone. You're not really surprised — you weren't entirely sure he'd agree to stay the night at all, and you sure as hell didn't expect him to make you breakfast in bed. You've got fuckall to do today so you just curl up in bed to enjoy that weird little state just between sleep and wakefulness for just an hour or two. You figure you'll bug Aradia to make you something to eat later, and maybe piss the day away watching a shitty movie you've both seen a hundred times.

Your rest is disturbed when your phone suddenly begins to ring from your bedside table. You reach over and grope across the tabletop blindly until you find it and pull it over for you to check. It's not a number you recognize — dreading the prospect of your number having been leaked yet again, you answer with some trepidation. "The fuck're you?" you sleepily slur.

"Sup," the voice on the other line casually greets you, and after a moment of slow and groggy deliberation you realize it's Dirk.

"Oh. It's you," you sigh.

"Jesus, don't act too excited to hear from me."

"I take it you found my number while you were snooping on my phone."

"Mhmm."

You release another long sigh, rolling over onto your back with your phone by your ear. Your ass doesn't hurt any less than it did before you got to sleep, and your lips are chapped and dry. You need a drink. "Well, whatever. Just don't give it out to anybody."

"The hell would I go and do that for? I want you all to myself."

You crack a crooked smile despite yourself. "Aren't you a sweet talker."

"No, I just want to monopolize your time so we can spend most of it having sex," he replies, utterly deadpan. The fact that you're not sure whether he's actually joking with such an absurd fucking statement should probably be a sign.

"My ass is utterly wrecked so that's not going to happen again for a while."

"That's fine. We can just do other shit 'til you're up to go again. How about I come back around tonight? You can blow me, maybe eat my ass a little. I'll return the favor, unless you snapped your dick in half too."

"What makes you think I want to see you again at all? You know this is _illegal,_ " you reply, a sharp edge to your voice.

Dirk snorts dismissively. "Oh dear fucking god, drop the goddamn act. You loved every fucking second I was inside of you and you're fucking gagging for another ride. Trying to play hard to get isn't gonna absolve you of being a desperate little cockslut — it doesn't fool me, and you're sure as fuck not gonna fool yourself. Just let yourself have what you want, holy shit."

You bristle defensively, sitting up in bed to shoot back, "I'm no—"

"Shut up," Dirk barks, cutting you off. "I'm sick of your posturing and your fickle indecision and your false fidelity to some fabricated framework of moral superiority. Just because you don't want to be attracted to me doesn't mean you aren't, it doesn't mean I can't see it, and it sure as hell isn't going to stop you from giving in eventually. Both of us fucking know this ridiculous song and dance serves no fucking purpose beyond allowing you to abdicate any responsibility for your actions, 'cause if you hold back you know I'll push and then you can _blame_ me for giving you what you obviously fucking wanted in the first place — and I'm willing to play along to a point, but eventually it just gets fucking tiresome. I don't have the time or the desire to humor the capricious whims of some petulant fucking child who doesn't have the balls to own up to what he wants and the person he actually is."

You huff, and you seethe, and you search for the words to fight back but you're flustered and overwhelmed and too put on the spot to muster any eloquence. "Fuck you," you snarl, hanging up the phone with trembling hands.

You drop your phone back onto the bedside table like it's hot, as if getting some physical distance between you and the receiver will actually do anything to quell your tumultuous emotions. You stare at the unassuming black rectangle angrily for a long while.

Eventually you pick up your phone again and send him back a text.

_9s fine again_

 

***

 

Just as you'd planned, you call over Aradia to kill time; she makes you a shitload of nachos at your request, and you pass around a joint while you watch _Harold & Kumar Escape from Guantanamo Bay_. Aradia is a predictably perplexing stoner — she'll agree to smoke with you, and affirm to you that she is indeed under the effects of cannabis, but she acts exactly the fucking same as she does when she's perfectly sober. You don't know if it's even physiologically _possible_ for her to loosen up. 

The weed and shitty movie help you forget about your ass pain for a while, but eventually you end up sober and alone again. Aradia leaves at around six, which leaves you several hours of bored introspection before Dirk comes back around. You lounge listlessly on your couch, staring up at the high ceiling with only your own thoughts for company.

You wonder how you're going to explain Dirk to the people in your life. Rose knows, and Aradia more or less knows (if she didn't before, seeing your beaten up lips and comical fucklimp probably clued her in) — you could handle them, but you don't know how to deal with the rest. It's not like you're really afraid they'll think less of you or reject you or anything, but it's been so easy to just never talk about that part of you that you don't know where to begin. Logically you know you have to get it out of the way, because as much as you'd like to keep Dirk as some sort of secret sex pet, _some_ day you'll get caught and there'll be no more pretending.

The person you're worried most about, though, is Jade. You dread breaking the fact you're seeing _anybody_ to her, let alone a dude — you haven't had a serious relationship since her and you'd honestly never pictured yourself having one again with anyone again. Not that your relationship with Dirk is _serious,_ but you've actually spoken to him more than once and remembered everything that happened in the morning which is a significant change from all of the other hookups you've had since.

You feel like you at least owe it to her to be honest about it. God knows it'd suck much more to find out months later from some fucking paparazzi photographs, and the last thing you want is her thinking you were secretly gay the whole time you were together.

With a groan, you pull yourself up off the couch and limp over to your office. You settle into your chair, finding an awkward position to sit in that keeps your weight off your ass, and open up Pesterchum.

turntechGodhead [TG] began pestering tentacleTherapist [TT]

TG: hey  
TG: you done bein a bitch cause i need your advice  
TG: i have PERSONAL PROBLEMS that need to be solved by you rose  
TG: come on  
TG: rose  
TG: rose  
TG: you cant seriously still be ignoring me i see youre online  
TG: you arent idle i know youre there  
TG: rose if you dont answer me right now im gonna jump in the bathtub with my laptop  
TG: ill type up a melodramatic note beforehand blaming you for everything  
TG: but then when i drop it in with me and dont actually die or anything its going to be really embarrassing for me  
TG: youre really gonna be burning with some vicarious shame when i recount that story in great detail later  
TG: and also my laptop will be broken  
TG: and ill have to buy a new one  
TG: which is pretty inconvenient i guess  
TG: ok fine ill bother john instead i like him more than you anyway

turntechGodhead [TG] ceased pestering tentacleTherapist [TT]

May as well kill two birds with one stone, you suppose.

turntechGodhead [TG] began pestering ectoBiologist [EB]

TG: hey dude  
TG: whats your busy ass doing online  
TG: dont you have cadavers to cut up or some shit   
EB: oh man, i actually didn't realize i'd signed in.  
EB: i AM supposed to be working.   
TG: thats great because im going to interrupt all that to talk to you about my problems   
EB: golly, this sure is an honor, bro.   
TG: you fuckin bet it is  
TG: anyway i cant talk to rose about this shit i need some advice  
TG: man to man you know how it is   
EB: well, will you at least do me a favor and ask me QUICKLY instead of drawing everything out into ridiculous monologues that go nowhere?   
TG: wow someones catty today  
TG: meeeeooww   
EB: shut up, dave.   
TG: hisssss   
EB: oh my god, just tell me what you want.   
TG: ok its about jade   
EB: oh.  
EB: what happened with her?   
TG: ok its not about jade  
TG: well   
EB: ...   
TG: its more like  
TG: what im gonna do about jade now that i did the thing that i did   
EB: what did you do?   
TG: well i sort of fucked a guy   
EB: hahahahaha, oh my god.  
EB: are you serious?   
TG: uh  
TG: yes   
EB: i'm sorry, but the irony is killing me here.   
TG: yeah yeah yeah laugh it up   
EB: i mean, it's just hilarious to me that you spent so much time calling me a fag and i'm like the only person in this family who didn't turn out to be a huge gay.   
TG: hey rose isnt a gay   
EB: er.  
EB: oh right.  
EB: i guess all those horrifying pictures of mom making out with madonna gave my brain a sapphic overload or something.   
TG: ugh dont remind me of those   
EB: yeeeaaahhh.  
EB: anyway, whatever, you're totally a huge hypocrite and i'm rubbing it in your face and such.  
EB: so what exactly is the issue?   
TG: well  
TG: im pretty sure this is going to be like a regular thing so i have to tell jade about it  
TG: but i dunno what to do   
EB: i don't think i even know what the problem is.  
EB: didn't you guys stop dating?   
TG: yeah we did  
TG: but i guess  
TG: idk i guess i just assumed once we werent both wrapped up in all our bullshit wed get back together  
TG: never really considered i might want something else  
TG: and now that this shits gone down i dunno what to do about it  
TG: like what am i supposed to say to her  
TG: sorry babe were over because your dick isnt big enough for me   
EB: it sounds like you were already over to me!  
EB: i mean, it's been like 2 years since you were dating.  
EB: i don't think it's gonna be that big of a deal.   
TG: it would have been for me  
TG: i dunno maybe im just a big clingy fucking baby   
EB: "maybe"?  
EB: that is definitely a thing that you are, dave.   
TG: you better close that big dumb gay mouth of yours egbert before i come over there and shut it for you   
EB: ohhhh, i take it all back.   
EB: you just totally proved what a tough strong man you are now. i am like completely impressed in every way by how much of a not baby you are.   
TG: damn straight  
TG: have you SEEN my muscles god DAMN i am fucking ripped   
EB: no you're not.  
EB: i'm more buff than you and the only exercise i get is carrying around medical textbooks.   
TG: dont sell yourself short dude those things are heavy as fuck   
EB: eheheheh.  
EB: anyway, hasn't she seen other people since you broke up?   
TG: if she has she hasnt told me about it  
TG: and we never really officially BROKE UP  
TG: we just  
TG: like   
EB: oh, oh, let me guess.  
EB: you're "on a break".   
TG: yeah i just realized i was basically about to say that and then my balls seceded from my body  
TG: brb let me go put them in the freezer   
EB: but...  
EB: if you haven't even seen each other in person in 2 years, i'm pretty sure that, like  
EB: the statue of limitation on your togetherness has expired at this point.  
EB: she's probably over you by now, dude.   
TG: is that supposed to make me feel better or worse   
EB: well, don't you WANT her to be over you?   
TG: yes  
TG: no  
TG: i dunno  
TG: fuck  
TG: i just want her to love me forever and never look at another guy again and also not be upset that ive ditched her for some middle aged dude im not entirely convinced isnt a serial killer  
TG: is that so much to ask   
EB: yeah that is probably too much to ask dave.  
EB: (also not even gonna comment on all that other shit you said. i don't want to know, don't tell me.)   
TG: dammit   
EB: just go talk to her about it, dude.   
TG: but what do i even SAY  
TG: man i never even told her i like dudes   
EB: seriously?  
EB: i mean, i guess i can see why you didn't tell me, what with the whole hypocrite shame thing.  
EB: i can totally understand why you'd want to maintain a facade of having just been a dick instead of a pitiably insecure tool.  
EB: but your girlfriend?   
TG: it didnt seem relevant   
EB: you are so dumb sometimes.  
EB: anyway, it's not like that changes my advice.  
EB: which can really hardly be called advice, since it's so obvious and something you should already know.  
EB: go! talk to her!!!!!!!!   
TG: when the hell did you become so sassy   
EB: i'm not sassy, you're just a huge baby.  
EB: and also evasive as HECK.  
EB: look, i just texted her and told her to get on pesterchum so you can even backspace a lot and pretend you're not shitting your pants and stuff.   
TG: god dammit john   
EB: pptthhbbbbbbbbttt.   
TG: what the fuck was that  
TG: did you just onomatopoeia a fart at me   
EB: i'm giving you a CRAZY raspberry.  
EB: my spit is just flying everywhere. it is chaos.   
TG: oh god jade just pestered me   
EB: good! you go deal with that.  
EB: anyway, i'm gonna sign off now and go back to learning how to save people's lives and stuff.   
TG: later man   
EB: later!

ectoBiologist [EB] ceased pestering turntechGodhead [TG]

gardenGnostic [GG] began pestering turntechGodhead [TG]

GG: john told me you had something you needed to say to me? :o   
TG: uh yeah  
TG: hey harley   
GG: hi dave!! :D  
GG: whats up?   
TG: nothing  
TG: actually  
TG: something but  
TG: how have you been   
GG: uh...  
GG: im fine!  
GG: is something wrong?   
TG: no  
TG: well  
TG: i just have something to tell you i guess   
GG: ? :o   
TG: i sort of started seeing somebody  
TG: like its not really serious but  
TG: theres kind of a thing   
GG: oh   
TG: yeah   
GG: is she anybody i know?   
TG: uh  
TG: he   
GG: he??  
GG: so youre.......  
GG: oh :o   
TG: im not  
TG: gay i mean  
TG: i like girls   
GG: well i knew that :p   
TG: ok i just didnt want you to think you were like  
TG: my beard   
GG: your what???   
TG: nothing nevermind   
GG: ok.... o_O  
GG: ohhh.... now the weird anal poop questions make sense   
TG: um   
GG: how come you never told me?   
TG: i didn't think it would ever matter i guess??  
TG: with all the politics involved i didnt think id ever want to actually do anything with a dude   
GG: i see what you mean  
GG: do you think this guy is worth it?   
TG: hahaha fuck no  
TG: its not like i can see myself being with this guy for the rest of my life  
TG: honestly i cant see myself being with this guy in a week  
TG: i cant see myself being with this guy in the fucking present  
TG: this entire situation is nuts   
GG: O_o  
GG: ... should i ask???   
TG: probably not  
TG: itll just end with you trying to talk me out of my self-acknowledged terrible life decisions and me not listening because apparently im still mentally 15   
GG: well ok then........   
TG: im really sorry   
GG: huh??  
GG: for what?   
TG: for  
TG: fuck i dunno im being stupid    
GG: well, as long as youre happy, im happy  
GG: :)   
TG: youre really not upset or anything???   
GG: we havent been together for a long time dave  
GG: i miss you!! but we broke up BECAUSE it was too sad to never see each other  
GG: it wouldnt make much sense to do that and then just keep on feeling terrible and alone!  
GG: its good that youve moved on   
TG: i guess i just thought that one day  
TG: i dunno   
GG: well who knows what might happen  
GG: well always be friends right??   
TG: yeah of course   
GG: :D  
GG: ok i gotta go  
GG: ill talk to you later ok?   
TG: yeah  
TG: see you   
GG: byyee!!

gardenGnostic [GG] ceased pestering turntechGodhead [TG]

That went like a fucking dream and you still feel like a piece of shit.

You release a long tired sigh as you close out of Pesterchum and prepare to get ready for what you're sure will be a very long night.


	11. Chapter 11

It's actually not that bad, when you allow yourself to let go of the drama. 

It seems like you didn't actually tear anything after all; the pain in your ass goes away after only a couple of days, and then it's business as usual. You invite Dirk over pretty much every night after that, and it gets easier every time, both physically and mentally. You just stop worrying about the consequences.

It's ritualistic, and it's comfortable — when Dirk is getting what he wants out of you, he's antagonizing you substantially less. You also don't really do much other than have sex, either, which on its face is probably a good thing for you. Every part of him that isn't his dick seems to have a way of driving you absolutely fucking insane, and it's not like you don't know he's a fucking hideous human being and an asshole of unbelievable proportion — but you almost begin to... miss _him_. For some completely incomprehensible reason, you actually _enjoy_ his stupid aggravating company in general. 

And an even stupider part of you wishes he would be more like your brother. God knows that that should be the last fucking thing you want, that you should be doing your fucking damnedest to _not_ dwell on the fact you're fucking someone of direct biological relation to you, but at times your desire for a relatively unfettered conscience is overruled by curiosity and an oddly placed sense of longing. You don't remember much about your brother at all — he was more a concept to you than a person, and a distant memory of one at that. He was there for you, and then he wasn't. That's the extent of it. The mystery is maddening to you, and the fact you want that person you barely even knew back is equally perplexing.

You try asking him questions about his life and who he is and who he was, but he shuts down immediately and blocks you out. You'd stop prying if you didn't feel you were at least obligated to an answer for the shit that involved you, but he doesn't seem to have any sort of interest in discussing _anything_ with you that doesn't end with his cock in your mouth. You vacillate between feeling kind of used and horrified by your own stupidity in _wanting_ more from him. You have about as good a thing as this awful situation with such a terrible man could even possibly allow.

So of course you're going to shit on it. 

There's less than a week left until shooting starts for the next SBaHJ film, an ordeal that will pretty much take you off the face of the planet for a solid three months, if you're lucky. You decide you may as well make use of your last few remaining days to wheedle some quality time — and hopefully answers — out of Dirk.

When Dirk comes around again for your scheduled booty call (wasn't hard to convince him to come up a few hours early with a "marathon fuckfest" excuse), you are prepared. Asking didn't work, so it's time to resort to peer pressure and substance abuse.

You hear a knock on your door at about four and hurry over to let him in. He gives you the most half-hearted greeting ever, and he barely has his foot through the door before he's unbuckling his belt. "Cut that shit out, we're not doing it yet," you tell him, turning to make your way to the living room couch.

Dirk follows you with a look of incredulity, like the concept of you wanting to do anything with him that isn't fucking is the most absurd thing he'd ever heard. "What?" he asks expectantly, his expression contorting into an even more repulsed spectacle when his eyes land on what you have laid out on the coffee table.

"Do you know what day it is?" you coyly inquire. Dirk sneers at you like he's smelled a rat — or, probably just the bag of ganja on the table.

"No. What the fuck is this?"

"It's 4/20, you fucking dumbass," you politely inform him, ripping out a sheet of rolling paper from your booklet. It has a large image of Snoop Dogg's face emblazoned across it; it was a gift he gave you for your last birthday. What a good gift. "We're gonna blaze."

"Are you stupid? I don't 'blaze'."

"You do now," you announce. You lay the paper out onto the table, sprinkle in a liberal helping of weed and set in the roach when you're satisfied that'll be enough. 

Dirk crosses his arms across his chest and regards you with tepid disdain. "No, I don't. I like my brain not being fucked up, thanks."

You snigger at him as you finish up rolling the joint. "Weed doesn't 'fuck up' your brain," you say, licking the paper to seal it. "Have you ever even smoked?"

"I told you I don't do any of that shit."

"So, in other words..." You take a moment to give him a broad, patronizing smile before you climb up to sit on the arm of the sofa, right next to where he's standing. You're at his eye level now, and staring him down, and like some sort of stupid irritable bull he doesn't seem to be able to turn away from such a clearly telegraphed challenge. He narrows his eyes and stands his ground as you light the joint, take a drag and then slowly blow the smoke out into his face. You take a degree of glee in the way he struggles to keep a straight face and not cough and sputter when it gets into his lungs. "You're _scared._ "

Dirk's brow furrows deeply as his lip curls into a sneer. "I'm not scared," he protests, and you struggle to not giggle mirthfully at how fucking _easy_ this is.

"You _are,_ " you titter, tossing your lighter back onto the table without looking away from his face. He's getting so _mad._ "You're a _pussy._ " You can't believe this is actually _working._ "You're a tiny little baby who can't handle not being in control for even a second. You're boring, can't even have fun."

"I have plenty of fun without drugs."

"Take the stick out of your ass. Sex on weed is great, we can just fuck the whole time, you'll like it. Besides, this is like the last day you have with me before I go away into film hell and don't come back for three months."

Dirk seems to be finally fed up with your taunting — he snorts, turns and moves to go, but you catch him by the wrist. "No, come here," you scold him, pulling him between your legs where you're seated at the edge of the armrest. You cross your legs behind his thighs, trapping him where he stands; he gives you the pissiest little brat look you've ever seen in your life, and you're grinning broadly when you take another drag of your joint. Dirk doesn't seem to realize what you're doing until you've already done it; you snake your free hand around to grip the back of his neck and pull him down to kiss you.

As soon as his lips touch yours you breathe out into his mouth, and he only inhales what he does out of shock. He can't play it cool this time. He full on sputters and chokes, coughing uncontrollably — he twists and pulls away from you and you let him go, but you laugh at him without mercy as he struggles to breathe. "I fucking _hate_ you," he hisses between coughs.

"Oh, I'm _sorry_. Did I hurt baby? Do I have to take little baby to the little baby hospital to see a little baby doctor to be sure his little baby lungs are okay?"

"I'm not a fucking _baby,_ " he spits. He's so mad. He's so mad and it's _hilarious._ This is the most fun you've had in months.

"You're right, I've seen babies puff with more grace than that."

"Babies don't fucking puff!"

"You're lucky too, otherwise that'd be _really_ embarrassing for y—"

Dirk snarls, stalks back to where you sit and snatches the joint out of your hand. You're practically giggling when he puts it to his lips and sucks in — he looks awfully proud of himself when he manages to blow it out again without coughing. You gleefully shit all over him.

"Great, you totally just wasted a whole toke."

"What?" Dirk replies defensively. "I _smoked_ it —"

"You barely fucking licked the damn thing," you say, plucking the joint back from him. "You have to hold it in for more than a millisecond if you actually want it to _do_ anything. Here, watch." You take a long drag, then watch him with a smug expression as you count the seconds away. At ten you slowly blow the smoke out, then offer back the joint with the most superior smirk you can muster.

Dirk takes it and tries again — you give him points for the effort, but he barely makes it three seconds before he starts coughing again. You can tell that not being good even at this tiny insignificant thing is driving him fucking _insane_ , and you can't help but revel in the small schadenfreude it affords. See how you like it, buddy.

"I guess that's good enough," you say as you take it back again, your tone just patronizing enough to inspire a delightfully furious facial tick from Dirk. Before he can respond, though, you let yourself fall back off the arm of the arm of the couch onto the cushions; you release a contented sigh and take another hit as you stare up at the high, high ceiling of your apartment.

Dirk begrudgingly makes his way around to sit beside your head on the sofa, scowling down at you in irritation. "I don't fucking feel anything."

"It takes a minute, dipshit."

"This is stupid," he grumbles. His hands are balled into fists in his lap and he looks so uncomfortable you might even feel bad about it if he weren't such a completely unrepentant fucking asshole.

With a groan you sit up, and promptly climb up onto his lap. Dirk is just confused and annoyed, doubly so when you pull off his shades and drop them back onto the table. "Here, let's try this again. Suck less this time."

"This is still stupid," he complains again.

"You're stupid," you say. Despite his protests, though, he doesn't stop you or push you off. You take another toke and press your lips to his again, but this time, he takes it like a champ. You breathe out into his mouth and he inhales the smoke, holds it as long as he can, and then shakily exhales it out between you. You can feel his heart racing in his chest where you're pressed against him. You're kinda getting a boner.

"Let's see how that hits you before you take anymore. You're probably a pussy little lightweight," you remark, moving off to stretch out onto the couch to smoke the rest of the joint yourself. At Dirk's scathing look, you deposit your feet in his lap.

Dirk looks at your feet like he's trying incredibly hard to set them on fire.

"Well, they're not gonna massage themselves," you say, giving your best smug half-smile.

"You've gotta be fuckin' kidding me."

"Nope."

Dirk sneers at you and pushes your feet off his lap. You put them back on. He pushes them back off. You put shove your feet in his face.

"Fuck, you stupid fucking brat," he growls, shielding his head with his arms. "Jesus _Christ,_ fine." He finally accedes and grabs one of your feet in his hands, introducing you to the angriest footrub you've ever received. The expression he wears while he's doing it is impressively begrudging, though it turns to one of perturbed amusement once his initial rage subsides. "Did you get a fucking pedicure?"

"What's it to you?" you ask as you lean back, close your eyes and contentedly begin to smoke down the last of your joint.

"That's some faggoty ass shit, dude."

You lazily crack open an eye. "Pretty sure sucking your dick and letting you fuck me in the ass ranks way above pedicures on the 'faggoty ass' scale."

"Nah, man, that ain't even... that ain't even the same _kind_ of thing." 

"Whatever, chumpski."

You fall back into a comfortable silence and you let your eyes flutter shut again, your joint just about burnt down to the roach. When you're satisfied that you're not getting anything else out of it, you just drop it on the table to deal with later and allow yourself to enjoy the pleasant haze of your mind.

Dirk elects to knock you out of your stupor with a sudden question. "What's your shoe size?"

You open your eyes to look at him again. "Uhh, nine. Why?"

Dirk just snorts. Then he starts laughing.

"What's so funny?"

"I don't... I seriously don't know," he chokes out between laughs. "It's... oh my god."

"You're fucking gay," you affectionately inform him. His laughter is infectious and you start up too. "Fucking fat homo bastard."

"I'm not fat," he wheezes. He's laughing so hard he honestly looks like he's in pain.

"Your dick is," you giggle impishly. Oh god, you think that's so fucking clever. 

That was apparently not the best choice of action, because it sends Dirk into a fit of hysterics that is impressive to behold. He doubles over over your feet in his lap, apparently physically incapable of stopping himself from laughing. You follow along for a while until it gets kinda ridiculous and you feel like you need to stop him; you sit up to tap his shoulder. "C'mon, let's go bang."

You carefully extricate yourself from the sofa and then grab Dirk by the wrist to roughly pull him along to the bedroom. He's still giggling as he follows you; you're not even sure if he's aware of what's happening. How the fuck is he already _this_ blasted off his ass? Your weed is some pretty decent stuff, but you didn't even give him that many hits. Shit, it's been so long since you blazed with anybody who doesn't smoke near on every damn day you don't even know what to do with weed virgins anymore.

Fuck it, who cares. You haul his stoned ass into your bedroom, turning to grab his face in your hands and kiss him hungrily as soon as you're through the door; he doesn't stop laughing even then, snickering against your lips as you back up into the bed and pull him on top of you as you let yourself fall back.

Dirk just barely manages to catch himself on his arms, and you have to fist your hand in his hair to remind him to keep sucking your face. You wrap your legs around his waist, arch up into his touch, breathe out a pleasured sigh as the heightened sensations run through your body; when he actually regains enough self-awareness to properly reciprocate, you're very glad you had this idea.

All too soon, though, Dirk decides this is the best time to suddenly have an idea. "Wait, hold on, wait wait wait," he says, grinning like an idiot. He pulls up off of you and practically prances over to your bedside table to snatch up your phone. "Wait wait wait wait wait..."

Frazzled, you sit up and raise an eyebrow. "What?"

"How do I... what is..." He screws around on your phone muttering to himself unintelligibly until he seems to find what he's looking for. "Wait. Okay. Wait, here!" He grins broadly as he points the phone's camera straight at you and triggers a distinctive beep.

"Oh _hell_ no," you hiss, scrabbling off the bed to snatch your phone out of his hands. "I'm not — you fucking shit, stop that!"

"Come on," he pleads, holding your phone out of your reach. No matter how much you jump or claw at his arms he won't give it back. "Dude, look, dude this'll be awesome, trust me. I'm like literally a porn director."

"A fucking puppet porn director, give it back, you slag. You shit. I hate you, fuck."

"Puppets — oh, yeah! Fuck. Fuck, look, go get a puppet. There's one over there. I left it on your dresser or some shit, go get it."

"Wha—"

"Dude, we'll make a puppet porn, it's the perfect idea. It's basically not even really porn but I can still jack to it? Whatever, come on."

"How the fuck do you even?"

"Dude listen, just like put the nose in your mouth. Trust me, this is brilliant. This is the best idea I've ever had, go get the fucking puppet."

"I—"

"Go get the fucking puppet, dude, I'm serious!"

Now _you're _the one who's too fucking high because this is actually starting to sound like an amusing idea to you.__

__Reluctantly, you back down from your attempts to retrieve your phone and shiftily move away to pick up one of the many puppets Dirk has strewn across your apartment (and stuck up your ass) since he's begun visiting. You grab the one he pointed out off your dresser — you're reasonably sure this one has never been tainted by your ass germs — and then crawl back onto the bed; Dirk sniggers lecherously as he sits behind the recording phone._ _

__"Wait, lemme put my shades on if you're gonna record this shit."_ _

__"Ok, whatever."_ _

__You find them where you left them on the bedside table. Although he's still very insistent on wearing his shades at every moment that is not sex, you don't bother putting yours on around him anymore — but in front of a camera is a different story. You have an image to uphold, even if it's a really grainy stupid one you'll delete as soon as you have your phone back. You slip on your shades and come back to sit on the bed with the smuppet in your lap."Okay. Okay, what do I do?"_ _

__"Put it in your mouth, idiot," Dirk scolds you, like puppet intercourse is supposed to be the most intuitive thing in the universe._ _

__"What, like the whole nose?"_ _

__"This isn't hard man, just pretend the nose is a dick. Suck on it, like, a lottle."_ _

__You shift on the bed, bringing the puppet's nose up to your mouth reluctantly — but just before you're about to put it in, he interrupts you._ _

__"Wait, I have to restart again 'cause you said all that stupid garbage and it'll kill my boner later to jack off to how fuckin' dumb you are."_ _

__You gape at him incredulously._ _

__"God, this is like common fuckin' sense and you can't even..." he mumbles to himself. Soon enough he's got it restarted and gives you an enthusiastic thumbs up. You sigh heavily._ _

__The first thing you notice as you drag your tongue along the underside of the phallic felt nose is how spectacularly fucking _dry_ it is. The moment your tongue touches it you feel like you've practically had all of the moisture sucked out of your mouth. You grimace but do your best to continue anyway, giving the camera your best porn eye as you slip the nose past your lips and slowly take it down as deep as you can manage._ _

__Despite the repellent dryness of the toy, you're actually getting pretty horny. You can see Dirk's erection in his jeans clearly from where you sit, which sort of compounds the issue. You do your fucking best — which is pretty valiant effort, given how effectively you're imagining his own cock in your mouth right now — but eventually you just can't do it anymore._ _

__"Ugh," you complain, pulling the puppet from your mouth. "I can't — dude, this thing is like, some sort of desert penis, I can't suck on this thing. Fuck, my mouth is dry, I need a drink hella bad —"_ _

__"I've got a drink for you right here," he says, crudely grabbing his junk in his free hand._ _

__You look at his dick, and then you think about your dick, and you admit you do kinda sorta really want to blow him. You groan and toss the puppet carelessly aside. "Okay, stop recording."_ _

__Dirk, of course, decides to be a little shit about it. "Come oonnnn. Lemme leave it on. It's just for me, baby. It's on your fuckin' phone even, nobody's gonna see it."_ _

__"Yeah right, you'll probably like, send it to my mom and shit."_ _

__"Why the fuck would I do that? I don't want anybody jackin' it to you. You're mine, dipshit."_ _

__"I hate to disappoint you man but half of America masturbates to me pretty much every day, I am really cool. I'm the best basically. Everybody wants me, that's a fact, I was Sexiest Man Alive, like, every single time? Everybody masturbates to the Sexiest Man Alive — holy shit, wait, did you mean my mom? Like were you implying my mom masturbates to me? Dude you're fucking nasty on a level I can't ev—"_ _

__"Stop talking, holyyyyy shit. Shut up, come suck my dick."_ _

__"Fucking douche," you mumble as you move to kneel in front of him and begin unbuckling his belt._ _

__Dirk snickers at you under his breath practically the whole time you're undoing his pants, and it's kind of annoying. You shoot a pissed off look up at your phone as you fish his cock out of his boxers, but you finally manage to shut him up when you wrap your lips around him and sink down._ _

__Just the bit of precum that dribbles onto your tongue seems to freshen you right up; you enthusiastically salivate as you lick and suck at his dick, pumping where your mouth can't reach with your hand. He's breathing much more heavily than he usually does, a hint of desperation edging its way into his movements as you pull back and lay a long, slow, teasing lick up along the underside of his cock._ _

__His hand finds its way into your hair eventually and he starts getting kind of forceful; he's trying to push you to take well beyond your limit, but you actually kind of start getting into the loss of control. You gag a little, but he doesn't go much further than that or try to jam himself all the way down your throat (probably more out of concern for your teeth on the thickest part of his cock than _your_ actual wellbeing) — you relax and let him fuck your face, licking and and sucking at him as he does most of the work._ _

__Your free hand wanders its way down to your own dick, and you clumsily attempt to work yourself out of your pants while your other hand and mouth are thoroughly occupied. You eventually manage it, and you moan out around his cock as you take yourself tight into your fist and begin to stroke. You're already pretty much fully hard, and between your horniness and the weed you have to back off to prevent yourself from nutting in like ten seconds._ _

__"Tell me you love my dick," Dirk breathes out, all but begging you in a needy tone you've certainly never heard before; he gives you just enough of a reprieve to pull back, but can't seem to resist rubbing and thrusting his cock against your face even as he expects a response._ _

__You take him in your hand and steady him to rub against your cheek, planting a kiss against the shaft. "Hnn, I love your dick," you comply. "It's so big and —" You had a whole _thing_ ready to go but it seems like that was enough for him, evidenced by the fact he hastily shoves himself back into your mouth._ _

__You begin to jack yourself in earnest as his movements grow more erratic and you feel him pulse and throb in your mouth — he doesn't usually telegraph when he's close that obviously, but here he doesn't have even a semblance of control. You feel like you have so much _power_ over him, even on your knees with his fingers in your hair and his dick halfway down your throat; every flick of your tongue and squeeze of your fist earns you a shudder or a poorly suppressed groan. It's nice to think this is how you really make him feel, behind the facade of implacability he imposes upon himself in everything he does._ _

__You pull out as you feel him begin to blow the beginnings of his load into your mouth; thankfully shielded by your shades this time, you stroke him in your hand as he shoots voluminous strands of cum over your face and into your open mouth. He pants and thrusts desperately into your hand as he comes — you slip him back into your mouth to ride him the rest of the way down, sucking and licking over the slit to catch every remaining drop._ _

__It doesn't take much longer until you finish yourself, spilling into your own hand as you suckle at his softening cock in your mouth. It hits you in waves, coursing through your body until you can't help but fall back onto your ass and all but collapse._ _

__"That was nice, I guess," Dirk remarks as he shuts off the recording and goes to drop your phone back on the table._ _

__You go to wipe the cum off of your face, only to discover your hand is _also_ covered in jizz. You end up getting even more spunk on your face. You groan. "Ugh, wait here. Lemme go wash my face."_ _

__You shakily pull yourself to your feet and make your way to the bathroom to do just that, rinsing off your shades and splashing your face with warm water. When you shut off the faucet and look up at the mirror, your eyes are so fucking red you look like you're bleeding out of your eyesockets. You take a minute to laugh at yourself before brushing your teeth — you figure you may as well get the boner off your breath while you're in there — and then wander back into the bedroom. You leave your shades in the bathroom and will probably forget about them and most likely end up shitting your pants the next morning when you're _convinced_ you've lost them._ _

__That's later, though, and for now your prime objective is shoving Dirk back down onto the bed. You all but pounce him and tear off his clothes and kiss and bite and rut against him, just the sensation of his skin against yours a high unto itself. You roll around for what feels like an eternity until he's hard again, and you ride him until you're fucking numb and the both of you are too exhausted to even move._ _

__You lay beside him as you're coming down off your high in a comfortable dazed silence. You kinda want to take a nap, but the fact you're hella kinds of hungry is kind of impeding that plan. In your sedentary procrastination you also remember something you've been putting off for weeks. Shit._ _

__"Hey," you say, rolling over to look at Dirk. "You still want me to adapt your script, right?"_ _

__Dirk looks back to you with a yawn and shrugs. "Honestly, I just wanted to fuck you. Don't really care whether you do or don't."_ _

__"Well, I think it's a good script," you sigh. His flippant lack of concern for you barely even registers anymore. "I still want to do it."_ _

__"Fine, then."_ _

__"I need to tell Meenah about the project," you groan, pulling your phone off the bedside table. "I won't be able to formally put the plans in motion until after I've finished filming SBaHJ this year at least, but I'll get it in my schedule."_ _

__"All right. Whatever."_ _

__You lazily stretch out on your stomach across the bed as you thumb through your contacts. "Fucking hate having to deal with this bitch," you mumble._ _

__"Fire her if you don't like her," Dirk says dismissively. He moves over to straddle your legs and set into an impromptu massage; you sigh appreciatively as he digs his fingers into the muscles of your back. How nice of him to do something for you without you having to extract it from him at gunpoint._ _

__"Can't, it's complicated. Anyway I'm calling her, be quiet."_ _

__You find her office number in your contacts and dial her up, holding the phone to your ear as you wait for her secretary to pick up. "Hey, I need to talk to Meenah," you immediately fire off as soon as the line is answered, eager to get your altercation with the lesser of the two bitches out of the way._ _

__Instead of the snide voice of Meenah's secretary, though, someone much more excited to hear from you calls out over the phone. "Dave!"_ _

__"Feferi?" you ask, surprised. What the hell is she doing answering the office phones?_ _

__"Hi! Sorry, mom's not here, um, she went downstairs for a minute! She'll be back soon I think?"_ _

__"Okay," you say. "What are you doing there? Aren't you supposed to be in school or something?"_ _

__"Oh, Tawny is sick today so mom brought me in to answer the phones! Plus it's like 5:30 and I do school online anyway, duuuuuuuhhhhh."_ _

__"... How old are you now?"_ _

__"I'm twelve!" Feferi beams, sounding as proud as can be._ _

__"Wow, you've really grown up."_ _

__"Yup. Mom says I do a better job on the phones than anybody in the building."_ _

__"Did she now," you sigh. She probably said that in front of all of the other girls, too. You imagine you'll be getting more tearful secretary phonecalls before long._ _

__Feferi doesn't seem to catch your less than enthusiastic tone. "Yeah!!"_ _

__You push Meenah's cuntery to the back of your mind and steer the conversation along to a more pleasant avenue. "Oh, did you get the gift I sent you?" you ask; you're surprised her mother never bitched you out for it._ _

__"I did. It was totally late."_ _

__"Yeah, I know. I'm an old man, I forgot. You like it, though?"_ _

__"Yes, it was the best gift ev-ER!" she exclaims, and you can't help but smile. "Oh my god, mom got _so mad_. She tried to send the installing guys away and everything. She was like, 'I'm not gonna shell out real money to keep a bunch of stupid fish alive'," Feferi affably babbles. Her impression of Meenah is laughably non-threatening, despite how very hard she tries. "But I told her I could totally handle it myself! I'll feed them and clean the filters and the tank and love them forever and I've even been selling some of the plushies and necklaces and stuff I make on my blog so I'll pay for it myself and everything. That's what I told her and she had to give in eventually. Hehehe."_ _

__"If you ever need money, you have my number. I'll give you anything you need, your mom never has to know."_ _

__"Okay, great! Oh, and I named one of the seahorses after you. He's yellow and has little dark spots around his eyes that make him look like he's wearing sunglasses, he looks just like you."_ _

__"Wow, thanks," you drawl. Not the most flattering animal you've ever been compared to._ _

__"It was a compliment!!" Feferi chides. "He is super cute!"_ _

__"You think I'm cute, huh?" you tease. Dirk digs his fingers especially hard into your skin, but you ignore him._ _

__Feferi gasps. You have to try pretty hard not to chuckle. "I didn't say that!"_ _

__"Uh-huh."_ _

__"I so didn't," she echoes, flustered. "You trapped me!"_ _

__"Mhmm."_ _

__"You — You — eek, mom's back, I'm gonna put you over, okay?"_ _

__"All right," you sigh. It's nice talking to Feferi, and you're less than eager to have to deal with Meenah again. You strum your fingers against the sheets in boredom as you wait._ _

__You still wonder if she's your daughter, sometimes — but Meenah must've fucked a guy a hell of a lot nicer than you to come up with a kid as good as Feferi. She didn't get that from you, and she sure as _fuck_ didn't get it from Meenah._ _

__Eventually your COO's predictably irritated voice sounds out over the phone. "What do you want?" she demands, evidently not any more eager to speak to you than you are._ _

__"Hey," you greet her, making some modicum of an effort to be cordial. "Wanted to let you know that I'm gonna be taking a new project on to direct. Probably around 2013, 2014 release?"_ _

__"And what project is this?"_ _

__"Met with a screenwriter. He pitched me a script and I'm gonna go with it."_ _

__"What's it about?" she asks. You're almost surprised that she's not trying to shut you down off the bat._ _

__"It's uhh... ok, well, it's a lot better than it sounds, but it's an adaptation of a book called Detective Pony which belongs to the Pony Pals series which is —"_ _

__"The screenwriter is the author of those books?"_ _

__"No, but —"_ _

__"You can't just adapt a book you don't have the rights to, Dave," she dismisses you condescendingly, like she thinks you're an absolute fucking _imbecile_ who didn't know that in the first place. Anger flares up in your chest and you have to grit your teeth to not snap at her._ _

__"I _know_ that. I already secured the rights from Scholas—"_ _

__"You already _paid_ for it?" Meenah snarls, pouncing on the first opportunity to tear you apart. She's touchy about money, and eight times as touchy about anything that you ever do. "Why was I not consulted for this? You can't just fucking _dip into company funds_ on a fucking whim without running it by me first, this'll completely throw off our budg—"_ _

__You groan. "Chill out, I paid for the rights and the script out of my personal funds. The company isn't legally or financially involved with it yet at all."_ _

__"Oh," she reluctantly accedes. There's an awkward moment of silence where you can _tell_ she wants to keep bitching you out, and is pretty disappointed she no longer has a reason to. "And where are you going to find the time to direct this? You're not going to tell me you're pushing back the SBaHJ cycle, because that would be fucking retarded."_ _

__"I know I'm already signed on for this year and next, but do we _really_ need to put out a new one every single fucking year?"_ _

__" _Yes,_ we really need to put out a new one every single fucking year," she echoes you in that sickening and falsely sweet tone of hers. "SBaHJ is an incredibly lucrative franchise, we're not going to stall production at peak profitability. We have a quick and well-oiled system and we're not going to change it so you can jack off a bunch of horses for a who knows how many years."_ _

__"Ugh, then I'll direct it while SBaHJ 2012 is in post."_ _

__"Then when will you write the script for the _next_ film?"_ _

__"I'll write it during _pre_ production for the SBaHJ before that. I do basically nothing for most of the end of March and April anyway, I can finish a script in that time."_ _

__"You better hope you're right, 'cause if you're wrong, the losses are coming out of your paycheck. Every single dime."_ _

__"Look, I don't even care. I could live for a thousand fucking years on the money I have right now even if I don't so much as pick another fucking penny up off the sidewalk for the rest of my life."_ _

__"Well, then," Meenah says. "I... _guess_ it's fine if you take on another project."_ _

__You just count yourself lucky it was this easy. "Good. It's a ways off anyway. Once we're through with shooting this year I'll start putting together a crew."_ _

__"All right. If that's all, I have work to do."_ _

__"No, that's it. Bye."_ _

__"Goodbye."_ _

__You release a heavy sigh of relief as you hang up and let your face drop into the mattress. "Hhnngghh. Glad that's done with. Cunt."_ _

__"Who was that other person you were talking to? Before her," Dirk grills you suspiciously. He's evidently not gotten his Cool Mask back in check because he's so transparently jealous you almost want to laugh._ _

__"... Dude, she's my COO's twelve year old daughter."_ _

__"And?"_ _

__"... And she's _fucking twelve?_ Are you _seriously_ jealous of a twelve year old girl?"_ _

__"You act like enough of a baby yourself, wouldn't put it past you to wanna fuck one."_ _

__"Oh my god," you groan in exasperation, knocking Dirk off your back. "You're ridiculous. I'm going to roll another joint."_ _

__"Do what you want. I'm takin' a fucking nap. Weed's stupid, you're stupid, I'm leaving reality until my brain is normal," he tersely pronounces, and then proceeds to collapse onto your bed to do exactly that._ _

__You retrieve your phone and some underwear and make an escape to the main area of the apartment. You grab a bag of Cheetos and a box of apple juice out of the kitchen, turn on the TV and flop back down onto the couch. Eager to get another blaze out of the way so you can eat probably the entire fucking bag, you roll yourself that second joint as quickly as you can manage._ _

__After you're sufficiently restoned, you wander across a showing of Battlefield Earth on the television and end up inexplicably enraptured, unable to pull your eyes away from the atrocity before you. Not even marijuana makes it bearable._ _

__Once you've gotten through the movie, five boxes of apple juice and _two_ whole bags of Cheetos, you text Snoop Dogg a picture of yourself documenting your egregious redeye and your grody Cheeto hand. You get one back not long after — he's wearing a Big Bird costume for some reason, and you assume he's having a house party, though the background of the photo is so obscured by smoke you can't be sure. You spend the next fifteen minutes giggling, fawning over the Snoop picture and licking your hand._ _

__Dirk eventually emerges from the cave, stomping and sounding spectacularly surly. You deftly exit out of your Snoop photo and inconspicuously drop your phone onto the coffee table. "Heeyyyy," you call out to him, sitting up on the couch; when you get a good look at him you're delighted to see he looks like he's been hit by a tornado, but he managed to get his boxers back on._ _

__"Hrrgghhh," he articulately responds._ _

__"What."_ _

__He comes around and collapses beside you onto the sofa. "I have a hangover."_ _

__"... You don't get hangovers from weed, dude."_ _

__"If it's not a thing I'm making it a thing because I feel like a sweltering dog's ass and it's entirely your fuckin' fault."_ _

__"Whatever, man," you dismissively drawl, picking up the remote to absently channel surf._ _

__"I hate you."_ _

__You pause to look at him, eyebrow raised. "You don't hate me."_ _

__"Yes I do."_ _

__"No you don't. You're mad I made you have fun. You're a pissy little baby man who doesn't like fun so now you're crying, you bitch."_ _

__"Shut up," he says, tipping over with his face pressed into the cushions. "Go away."_ _

__"Nah," you yawn. In fact, you elect to climb right on top of him and stretch out over him. "Think I'm just gonna hang out here for a while."_ _

__Despite his growling and half-hearted irritation, he doesn't actually make any moves to knock you off of him, and you return to your shitty television viewing with your cheek rested against his back._ _

__"... I'm hungry. You got any Cheetos?" he eventually asks, voice muffled by the sofa beneath him._ _

__You sit up and look around you; the area immediately surrounding the couch is a fucking mess. The table is covered in empty juice boxes and Cheeto bags and all of your leftover weed shit you need to clean up. "Uhh. No. I ate all of the Cheetos."_ _

__"Weren't there like two bags left."_ _

__"Yeah."_ _

__"You ate _both fucking bags._ "_ _

__"Yeah."_ _

__Dirk groans dramatically, but doesn't make any move to budge from his spot._ _

__"Fuck it, I'll order a pizza," you sigh, grabbing your phone off the table. Dirk gives you an unintelligible but presumably encouraging sound of approval, and you quickly bring up your contacts to dial the nearest pizza place._ _

__Twenty minutes of shitty television and Dirk complaining later, the delivery guy knocks on your door. You don't even bother getting dressed; you go right up to answer the door in your underpants and an utter lack of shame. The delivery boy gets one look at you and laughs. "Happy 4/20, dude."_ _

__You don't think he even recognized who you are. "Yeah, yeah," you mumble. You tip him a 20 and take the box inside; the smell of the pizza seems to be enough to finally rouse Dirk from his stupor, and you wordlessly drop it into his lap before you make a detour back to your bedroom._ _

__When you return you've retrieved your laptop, but you momentarily set it aside as you roll yourself yet another another joint. "Here. Once I'm done with this I'm gonna work on the SBaHJ script and you can watch."_ _

__Dirk quirks a condescending brow as he glances down at you beside him. "You write while stoned?" he asks, and even with his mouth full of pizza you can detect traces of disdain in his voice._ _

__"You're literally the first person I've ever met who was surprised by that, or even didn't suggest that I _must_ have been when I made my movies."_ _

__"That line of thinking is fuckin' stupid. Booze, weed, crack, shit's all the same — turns you into an idiot and the only thing idiots make is idiot work. Drug 'creativity' is a fucking mockery of the —"_ _

__You roll your eyes and cut off his diatribe. "You can climb off the pulpit, preacher man. I end up throwing out most of this shit when I'm sober again but it's funny to read through the next morning." You look to him with your most serious expression and patronizingly ask, "You ever heard of fun, bro? Do they have that where you come from?"_ _

__"We come from the same place, moron. Literally the same exact vagina, even."_ _

__"Thanks so much for reminding me," you deadpan, taking a slice of pizza from the box to shove into your endless cavern of a face between tokes._ _

__You and Dirk make short work of the pizza, and you make short work of your joint — you try to convince him to smoke another himself, but he won't hear a word of it. All you can manage to finagle out of him is getting him to actually watch your stoned out work on the SBaHJ script._ _

__"Okay, okay, get this," you start, attempting to explain the deep underlying themes of the movie to him. "The plan for next year is to go out to New Zealand and shoot on location, right? But we're not gonna, like, shoot out in the hills and shit, we're just gonna rebuild our set. But in New Zealand. And we're gonna do the same shit we always do except... in New Zealand._ _

__"Oh, and we got Sam Jackson on board too. But listen to this! We're putting him on as a grip. Like, we're still paying him his full actor's salary? But he's just gonna be like, credited as a grip and he probably won't even do anything besides hang out with the cast, basically we just scheduled a five month long vacation to New Zealand and we'll probably just spend the whole time trying to get plastered in every pub in the country before it's time to come home. It's a political commentary, you know?"_ _

__Dirk looks at you with an expression of honest revulsion. "What the fuck is _that_ supposed to be a commentary on?"_ _

__"The wealth divide and wasteful government spending, man," you say with a broad grin, furiously typing in a scene. You're on a roll here. The toked out garbage is flowing from your fingers like water from a wellspring of spectacularly terrible ideas._ _

__"... I think I'm gonna throw up."_ _

__"What?" You glance at him dismissively. "Dude, this is hilarious. This is like, this is like some sharp as hell shit. Hella teeth on this plan. The media will be all over this when we declare our budget, it'll be a firestorm."_ _

__"Sounds like a hypocritical load of shit to me. Given how you practically fucking wipe your ass with hundred dollar bills in your private life I don't think you're in any position to be making that sort of criticism."_ _

__"This shit is what I do. The critics will eat it up, it doesn't even matter."_ _

__"You're a regular old beacon of truth and honesty. Glad you're here to shape our culture," Dirk says with all the sweetness of sour milk, settling back against the sofa with his arms disapprovingly crossed across his chest._ _

__You immediately stop and twist around to laugh in his face, your eyes practically bugging out of your skull in your incredulity. "Hahahaha, are you fucking _kidding_ me, wow, _wow,_ we're getting into _metahypocrisy_ here, did you somehow _forget_ the fact you basically tricked me into committing _incest_ and —"_ _

__Dirk chooses to interrupt you by roughly slapping you upside the head._ _

__"The fuck was that for??"_ _

__"Being a shit. Now shut up and just tell me about the movie."_ _

__You tell him about the movie for a good long while, talking him through some of the less maddening aspects of the creative process. You work on the script at a decent pace as he looks over your shoulder and comments occasionally at the "straight up unfunny, honestly embarrasing shit garbage" you're producing, but eventually you run out of steam and decide that's more than enough weed for one night._ _

__You set your laptop aside with a yawn and rest your head in his lap. He turns his gaze back to the TV as he absently strokes your hair with his fingers, but neither of you are paying any actual attention to the bullshit on the screen — this time more from exhaustion than passive-aggressive evasion. You figure now's as good a time as any to strike._ _

__"You know, you still haven't told me what the fuck happened back when I was a kid," you eventually say, staring up at him from his lap. His hand stills in your hair and you immediately notice his posture stiffening, and if you weren't physically right on top of him you're sure he'd run._ _

__"Do you really gotta keep bugging me about that shit?" he asks, searching for an out. You don't give him one._ _

__"Yeah, shithead. I deserve to know where I came from."_ _

__"I don't see why you even give a shit. It was a fucking lifetime ago."_ _

__"You fucking abandoned me, which is sort of a traumatizing experience for a kid shunted around a thousand fucking foster homes before the age of five," you say. You don't actually remember it that well — you know more about how you felt back then from what your mom told you you were like than you personally recall._ _

__He pauses for a moment, like he's struggling with his answer. There's a slight strain to the tone of his voice when he eventually speaks again. "It was my fault it was like that for you anyway."_ _

__"What?"_ _

__"The fuck do you think I was like as a newly fucking orphaned 13 year old little cunt?" he says with a snort and a tone of carefully calculated nonchalance. "The reason we got tossed around so many homes was 'cause of me. Little old Christian ladies don't take kindly to having their cars stolen or their sons felt up by unrepentant fags. So when I got kicked out, you came with me." Dirk shrugs a shoulder. "Then when I turned 18 they threw me out of the system and I didn't look back."_ _

__You got him going, so you just keep on prying. "Why didn't you take me with you?"_ _

__Dirk just laughs. "You fuckin' stupid? You really think an 18 year old high school dropout working under the table at a fucking garage had any business raising a kid? Besides, they never would've given me custody in the first place. If living in a flea-ridden shithole with barely enough money to feed my own damn self wasn't enough, it was the fucking 80s in Texas and I was obviously a faggot."_ _

__"You could've at least kept in touch with me."_ _

__"What good would that be? Better for you to just forget about me and all that shit," he says, an edge of bitterness creeping into his voice. "Don't try to tell me I would've been a better parent than your rich-ass scientist mom, and if I'd stuck around I'd probably have fucked that up for you too. Ditching you was the best thing I ever did for you."_ _

__You're quiet for a while, looking up at him as he resolutely stares at the television with hard eyes and a tight jaw. "... I'm sorry."_ _

__He won't look at you. "For what?"_ _

__"I didn't really consider how hard for you it must've been."_ _

__"Oh, fuck off. I don't want your fucking pity," Dirk snorts._ _

__"I wasn't offering any."_ _

__You sigh and sit up. He finally looks to you at your sudden movement, and you take the opportunity to lean in and brush your lips to his. You try to make it nice, kissing him slowly and tenderly as you card your fingers through his hair, but you eventually realize he's so insecurely tense and uncomfortable with that kind of affection that you just sigh again and push him off._ _

__"I'm gonna go to bed," you announce, rising from the couch. "Are you staying the night again?"_ _

__He takes a moment to give his carefully dispassionate answer. "... No, I think I'm gonna go home."_ _

__The both of you sit in an awkward silence for a time, but when you can't think of anything to say, you eventually just give a half-shrug and tell him goodnight before you climb into your empty bed and sleep._ _


	12. Chapter 12

The days roll on.

Principal photography for SBaHJ begins at the end of April, and all of your time becomes resolutely consumed by work. You drive to the set every day at six in the morning and you're lucky if you get out by eight at night; many days you end up stuck until midnight or later. The hours are brutal, but they at least mean you get through shooting (relatively) quickly, and keep the SBaHJ franchise rolling on its clockwork movie-a-year cycle that Meenah adores so much.

You warned him repeatedly that this would happen, but Dirk didn't seem to really comprehend just how seriously busy you would be until shooting actually began. You all but vanish off the face of the earth to him, as he is eager to remind you; the most substantive interaction you seem to be able to get with him is a phone call or pesterchum conversation at lunch, and all bets are off on actually getting time off to see him in person.

You get all of a month into filming before it seems like Dirk is going to go fucking insane — he was calling you near on every day at the beginning, but after you have to refuse to see him time and time again, even his persistence eventually dwindles in the face of your workload. You've had sex all of twice since filming has started, and he seems more stressed out by your schedule than you are.

For some reason, you start to actually feel bad for _him_. You told him you wouldn't have time, and it's only for three months, but he grows so piteously forlorn over not being able to fuck you as often as he'd like that you start considering a much more permanent — and stupid — solution than is probably warranted.

Dirk's backed off again, but when he calls you for the first time in a week it's right when you know you're going to be stuck working late again. You're waiting for the lighting and makeup to be redone for the next scene when he calls you at ten.

"Hey, you gonna be free tonight?" he asks, a poorly concealed, impatiently demanding tone to his voice that has rapidly grown to become characteristic.

You lean back in your ratty director's chair with your phone to your ear and release a sigh. "No, not tonight. Still on the set. I don't think I'll be home until one, probably. The cameraman shit the bed on our good take and nobody noticed 'til we'd moved on, so we're gonna have to reshoot it and that'll take all fucking night."

There's a brief pause. "I haven't gotten laid in over a week," Dirk complains. 

"I _told_ you th— ugh." You interrupt yourself as one of the crew walks past where you're seated. When you speak again, your voice is dropped to a whisper. "Look, it's not like I'm any less keyed up than you are. But I'm working 12 to 20 hours a day, I don't have the time or the _energy_ to..." You trail off, suspiciously glancing about for anyone who could potentially overhear. "Hold on, lemme take this to my trailer."

Dirk sighs dramatically over the line and waits as you make your way out back to where the trailers are parked, a veritable throng of people moving to and from the darkened lot. Between the dying street lamps' poor illumination and your omnipresent shades, actually seeing where you're going is a fucking feat, but you've tread this path so many times you could probably get there literally blind.

After ensuring no one is loitering around your trailer, you climb up into the vehicle and close the door securely behind you. You pull off your shades and flop down onto the trailer's narrow fold-out couch, psyching yourself up for what is no doubt about to be a daunting conversation.

"Oka—"

"We barely even see each other anymore," Dirk grouses as soon as he gathers that you've settled down.

"I know," you groan in exasperation. You pause for a moment to consider how to word what you want to say, how to best navigate his dumb ass neurotic bullshit — but you eventually conclude you just don't have the fucking energy for theatrics. "Fuck it, do you want to just move in with me?" you ask, straight to the point.

Dirk seems legitimately taken aback by the question. There's a long, awkward silence before he eventually replies, "What?"

Well, at least he hasn't dismissed the suggestion off the bat. That's more than you'd expected. "I mean, there are still three months left until shooting is completed and my schedule isn't gonna get any clearer until then. If you live with me we'll at least be able to see each other in the mornings."

His responses grow markedly strained, with lengthy pauses between when you speak and when he actually answers. "... I don't know," he says non-committally; you can tell he's pretty torn between the opportunity to get laid more frequently and anything that would confer some sort of increased degree of intimacy and domesticity. 

"Why not?" you ask, even if you know this ridiculous song and dance is practical obligate from his stupid man pride bullshit. May as well just play along.

"I don't want to be your _pet_ ," is the reason he settles on. You sigh.

"You wouldn't be my _pet_. You'd be my fuckbuddy, who lives with me."

"I couldn't afford to pay the rent for whatever that fucking sky castle is worth."

"I don't pay rent, I own the entire apartment complex."

"Yeah, _you_ own it. I don't."

"Jesus Christ," you groan. You know better than to try to convince him that being a kept man wouldn't be the death of his manhood. "Then keep paying for your old shithole while you stay with me. The fact you fucking _live_ there weirds me out aside, it's fucking disgusting —"

"My apartment is fine," Dirk stubbornly interjects, a clear hint of offense in his voice. His apartment is a fucking sty in the worst part of town — you drove him home exactly once, and you don't have enough fingers on both hands to count the number of things in that building that made you want to vomit. The halls smelled so heavily of cigarettes you couldn't stand it, and his apartment itself was covered in mold and water damage and what he very resolutely assured you _wasn't_ rat shit. He hadn't had a rat problem for over two weeks.

But he worked for it, and he paid for it with his own money, so of course shittalking it has wounded his precious pride.

"Whatever. If it makes you feel better to keep it, then do that. Hell, you could move back out once filming's wrapped if you want," you say, before moving on to a more blatant angle of persuasion. "I just want to fuck you more than once every two weeks, dude."

"... I need my own space," he eventually replies. Not an outright refusal. You can work with that.

"That's fine. I've got a guest room you could take. It has its own private bath and everything."

Another long pause. You kinda wish you could see the look on his face; he's probably doing that thing where he looks like he's constipated with indecision, but is trying his best to conceal it, in the process making himself look even more constipated. He eventually gives you a phenomenally reluctant answer: "All right."

"That's it? You'll do it?"

"I... guess," he begrudgingly accedes. He's quick to add, "If it gets me laid more often." Heaven fucking forbid he let on that there might be any other reason he'd want to live with you beyond an increased ability to pound your sweet ass.

You sigh.

"Whatever. Pack your stuff, I'll call you next time I've got a free night and help you move in. Should probably be tomorrow, even, we have a relatively light schedule planned."

"All right."

"Fine."

You hang up the phone, glad for a little relief to a remarkably shitty day.

 

***

 

Rather unusually for you, you actually luck out and get out fairly early from shooting the next day. Right when you'd planned, even! Unheard of.

You call Dirk, drive home, and you're not back in your apartment five minutes before he texts you to come help him bring shit up from his car.

_ill have aradia come down so nobody sees me,_ you text back. He doesn't respond.

You grab your keys and go and make your way over to the back door of your apartment, across the short balcony linking your apartment and the service elevator floor you share with Aradia, and then through the mirrored set of doors on her side of the building.

"Hey, Aradia," you shout out into apartment as you let yourself in. She doesn't get much privacy with your nosy ass constantly barging into her apartment, but she's never raised an objection. "You got a minute?"

Your assistance emerges from her bedroom at the sound of your yelling, as duteously prepared as she always is. "Yes. What do you need?"

You throw your thumb over your shoulder as you lean against the doorframe. "I, uh, need your help bringing some shit up into the apartment," you say. Aradia's look is mildly inquisitive, and you reluctantly clarify. "Dirk does. He's moving in."

"All right," Aradia says, predictably unfazed. Or what _should_ have been predictable to you. She's never given a shit about anything you've ever done in your entire life, and yet for some reason you still constantly worry about her judgment. "Where am I needed?" she asks after you sort of just stare awkwardly at her for a moment.

"Oh, uh, he's out in the back lot. Just look for the oldest and shittiest looking car you can find and that'll be him. I'll leave the service elevator doors open."

You make your way back into your apartment to wait after Aradia's gone down the lift. After another few minutes, you hear the sound of the elevator returning and get up to look at what they've brought in. Aradia is carrying a suitcase and a box, and Dirk is burdened by two other relatively small boxes. You know for a fact that Aradia can carry a hell of a lot more than that, so you surmise that that's all he's brought.

"Is that it?" you ask, taking one of the boxes off of Dirk's hands.

"Yeah. Not like I have much shit to bring," he replies, something aimlessly bitter and challenging about his tone. You surmise that he wants to go about this as reluctantly as possible, but can't actually find anything to complain about. You elect to just ignore his aggravating petulance.

You bring the box into the apartment and leave it on the dining table for now; Aradia and Dirk follow your lead, placing the rest of the stuff next to where you put it. You thank Aradia for her help, and she quietly excuses herself, making sure to lock all the doors behind her as she leaves. After she's gone, you turn to Dirk and set off into a spiel.

"Okay, before we unpack this shit, here're the rules. Don't go in my office, and don't touch my computers. You can do whatever you want, otherwise. If you need food or anything you can just ask Aradia and she'll —"

"I can buy my own shit," he interrupts. Pissy brat voice.

"Whatever," you brush him off. "Also, don't loiter in the apartment complex, if you wanna come and go use the service elevator. Don't park your car near mine. Don't leave the apartment less than ten minutes after I leave. Don't order out yourself or do anything that would require someone seeing you here, if you want a pizza ask Aradia to do it for you. Don't talk to any of the building staff." The realization hits you. "... Shit, I totally forgot about the maid service. I'm gonna have to cancel it."

A sneer gradually blossoms over Dirk's face as you list off the numerous things he is required to do so that he may remain your dirty little secret. By the time you're through, he looks thoroughly annoyed. "Okay, so you want me to hide myself here like some sort of fugitive?"

"It's not like we can fucking _tell_ people, dude," you say. "If the fact I was fucking you got out I'd be dead."

"Why?"

God _dammit._ "I don't know, because you're my fucking _brother?_ "

"Nobody knows that. Everybody who knows who I am to you is dead. All anybody would know is that I'm some guy."

"Yeah, exactly. A _guy,_ " you say sharply. You've been over this enough times that it's more than tiresome to have to go through it again. "The media thinks I'm straight, remember? It'd be a horrific shitstorm —"

"You're such a fucking coward," he interrupts yet again. "Who _gives_ a fuck? It's not like it'd even affect your career in any meaningful fucking capacity. You're your own fucking boss, nobody's gonna fire you. The only thing you're afraid of is some petty goddamn gossip, which is honestly pathetic."

You're not beyond the point of being fazed by his confrontational bullshit, but you're at least learning how to deal with it. Telling yourself that he's some sort of real life troll trying to deliberately bait you into an emotional response is the only way you are able to remain sane, so you put on your best dismissive airs and inform him of how little a shit you give about his opinion. "Whatever, guy, when you're a public figure with a reputation at stake you can call the shots. But until then, I'm choosing to not deal with the fucking drama. It's not worth it."

"This shit affects me too. Having to sneak around is fuckin' stupid."

"Then leave if you don't like it," you declare, making it very clear in your tone that this is the end of this conversation. You turn and move to the kitchen to get a knife to cut open the boxes with.

Dirk, of course, ignores you. "S'not like you'll even be _able_ to hide it. We'll slip up, eventually. Might be years from now, might be a month from now. It's only a matter of time 'til somebody talks, and then what?"

You stop with your hand curled around the handle of your knife, still in its block. You turn back to him, brow furrowed. "... Are you threatening me?"

"God, you're fucking ridiculous," Dirk snorts.

"No, really, what the fu—"

"All I'm saying is that you're a fucking fool if you actually believe this is gonna stay quiet forever so I don't see the goddamn point in playing this dumb little game."

You pause and share a tense confrontational stare, before you finally break the silence with, "I'll cross that bridge when I come to it."

"Suit yourself."

You pull the knife out of the block and stalk your way back to the table. You cut through the tape on the one taped box and set the blade aside, but when you look back to Dirk you feel oddly uncomfortable about leaving a sharp implement within his reach, so you pick it back up again and return it to the kitchen. He watches you as you leave and return, but doesn't comment.

You open the box closest to you and make a quick survey of the contents. It isn't really much of anything: just a few old DVDs; a VHS for _Let My Puppets Come_ — which appears to be a puppet sex move from the 70s; a number of books about fucking Plato of all things; and an assortment of shit you can't even identify. You're setting them out onto the table when you make the mistake of glancing up at Dirk, as he pulls something out of one of the other boxes that makes your blood run cold.

"Holy shit, what the _fuck_ is that??"

Dirk stills mid-motion to look at you like you've gone nuts. "What the fuck is what? It's just Lil Cal, dude."

Oh god. Oh _god._ You'd thought you'd forgotten that fucking thing but it's all coming back now — it's gotten a couple of decades on, with nicks and blemishes you don't remember, but that sure as hell is the same fucking doll.

You remember how its beady little fucking eyes would follow you wherever you went, how you could see it fucking move out of the corner of your eye, how you could swear you could hear it whisper if you were close enough, and the shit it said was never fucking good. You used to wake up in the middle of the night and see it sitting on your fucking chest and it felt so heavy you couldn't even move, and you'd cry and fucking cry until your Bro woke up and he'd have to crawl into bed with you because that's the only way he could get you to stop before your foster parents would hear and come yell at Bro even though it was your fault.

Your heart is beating so fast you can hardly stand, and your locked stare on that abomination doesn't help at all. It's like all twenty-seven years of lost time just hit you in the chest all at once except it's the most awful fucking feeling and holy _shit_ you're practically having a fucking panic attack over a fucking _doll_ what is _wrong_ with you —

"It's just a fucking doll, dude," Dirk echoes your inner dialogue, brow condescendingly quirked. Your eyes snap up to his, and after you've finally broken from its stare you desperately resolve to look anywhere but at _it._

"Just... just keep that thing in your room. I don't want to see it. Please," you outright _beg_ him, well fucking beyond any measure of pride at this miserable point.

Dirk just stares at you for a moment before finally shoving Cal back into the box. It feels like a weight has been lifted when the infernal demonic effigy is safely out of your sight. "Whatever, man," he dismissively drawls, before picking up the box to walk past you to his new room.

Kind of shell shocked, you leave the rest of his stuff on the table and wander over to the living area to slump bonelessly onto the couch. That's where you remain until he emerges from the bedroom not long after. You look up at him, your expression evidently so pitiful that he immediately rolls his eyes at the sight of you.

"I'll unpack later," he says. "Don't tell me you're too scared to fuck tonight, it's only ten."

"I —" You honestly want to tell him no, but you feel bad enough for him and dick-starved enough yourself that you resolve to just power through this awkward setback. "Can you just — give me a minute?"

"Whatever. I'm gonna go take off my clothes and lay on your bed and start jacking off, and if you don't come in by the time I'm done I'm just going to jizz all over your sheets and then fall the fuck asleep," Dirk announces as he strides past you to your bedroom, presumably to begin doing exactly what he just described.

You don't know what to do other than to sigh.


	13. Chapter 13

Living with Dirk is... surprisingly not as bad as you had feared it might be. Apart from the increased influx of puppets he leaves lying about the apartment, he's surprisingly unobtrusive. He keeps to himself, mostly; it's not really that much different from when you were living apart. He keeps Lil Cal in his room like he promised, along with the rest of his life — you don't mention his work and he does you the courtesy of keeping it out of your sight. You haven't even been into that bedroom since he moved into it, though that's at least partly your 16 hour a day job winning out over your curiosity.

Most of what you do is sex. He's taken to waking you up in the morning for quickies — which are exhausting, not particularly satisfying and cut into the sleep you're already not getting near enough of, but it seems to put Dirk well enough at ease. That makes you feel better about it. The added burden of having to contend with his whiny sex-starved bullshit was more stressful than you'd even realized, and being rid of it is a big relief.

But of course, he wouldn't be Dirk if he didn't try his fucking hardest to make your life as miserable as possible.

He starts deliberately marking you, in places that are remarkably difficult to conceal. You wake up one morning to discover a distressingly large and visible bruise on the side of your neck, which you're sure is going to take days to fade — which proves to be a source of inordinate distress as it disrupts your already hurried morning routine.

Dirk staggers into the bathroom like a zombie after presumably being roused by your loud cursing, and chooses to greet you by wrapping his arms around your waist and licking the back of your neck in the most distracting manner possible.

"You're a dick," you hurl at him as you elbow him off, shooting him a glare that proves as ineffective as anything you ever do to try to get him to stop being a shit.

"The hell did I do?"

"I have to go into work like this," you complain, pawing at your neck as you survey the damage in the mirror.

Dirk snorts dismissively as he walks around you to get a proper look himself. "Who cares? It looks like you had a fuck, which you did. Big deal."

"I don't _have a fuck_ during a shoot," you grumble, pushing him out of the way to squeeze toothpaste out onto your brush. "There's no time to pick up chicks, that's fucking crazy. They'd know something was up."

"You really expect me to believe that anyone would be surprised about _Dave Lalonde_ getting laid."

You shoot him an aggravated glance. "The only people who get to fuck during our shoots are the ones who have somebody _waiting at home_. People are going to start talking about my _new special lady friend_ and that's going to invite rumors and bullshit. You follow?" 

He follows, but fails to give a fuck. "Is it really so fucking hard a sell that you had a hookup _once_ during the shoot?"

"Ugh," you groan, shoving your toothbrush into your mouth. He just stands around as you frantically brush your teeth, watching you with mild disinterest. When you spit the paste out into the sink, he chimes back in with another aggravating instigation.

"You're making a big deal out of nothing. Again."

You choose to not respond to his comment and instead push past him to walk back into your bedroom and then to your closet — he follows at your heel like a particularly annoying dog, watching you intently as you hunt for something to wear. He gives you another conceited laugh when he gets a proper look at what you picked out.

"They're gonna be more suspicious about you wearing a fucking turtleneck in the middle of fuckin' June than they will be about a few bite marks," he says, snidely smug, but you opt to reenter the bathroom and slam the door in his face over dignifying him with a response.

 

***

 

You don't know if anybody gives a shit about your turtleneck, but you sure as hell notice the heat.

 _Holy fucking shit._ The studio itself is air conditioned, but not fucking enough, and the heat of the lights and equipment threaten to knock you the fuck out. It's a struggle to even function, even with the relatively light shoot you have today, and there are multiple points where you're tempted to just take your fucking shirt off entirely because it's a misery that you can scarcely withstand.

But withstand you do — at least until you arrive home, and Dirk greets you with a shit-eating look that tells you right away that he knows he was right and is very, very eager to rub it in your face.

"Piss off," you tell him. He takes this as an invitation to pin you to the wall, tear off all of your clothes and fuck you until you're so exhausted all you can do is pass out.

In the morning you're greeted to a repeat performance of the previous day.

You stare into the mirror in exasperation, though you're certainly not surprised. In addition to the bruise on your neck from yesterday, Dirk saw fit to add another two to your throat, along with a particularly nasty bite mark on your shoulder. And just like the day before, he follows you into the bathroom to gloat.

"Good morning," he says. Only he could make such an innocuous statement so clearly intended to piss you off.

"This is stupid. You put one so high not even a turtleneck is going to cover it."

"Maybe I want them to see it," he purrs, voice low, and sidles up beside you to drag his tongue up along your throat. You shudder under his touch and push up into him despite yourself, and he seems to take that as an invitation to bite into your exposed flesh yet again.

"Stop it, goddammit," you complain, pushing him off. He grins at you and wipes the spit from his chin as you rub your sore neck.

As he stares down at you with that creepily lascivious and possessive look, it finally begins to dawn on you exactly what game he's playing at.

"You're gonna keep doing this until I go into work with these."

He doesn't say a word. Instead, he opts to just keeps leering at you with smug self-satisfaction.

"If I do it _once_ will you stop?" you ask. You'd rather give in to his bullshit than suffer another day in the heat with that fucking shirt.

"Maybe."

"Maybe isn't good enough. I want your word on it."

"Like my word is worth shit."

You groan in exasperation.

 

***

 

Faced with just about no other reasonable choice, you go into work. It's just as irritating as you'd expect — you get double-takes, cat calls, and numerous members of the cast and crew not-so-subtlely grilling you on the state of your love life. Shooting was light enough the day before that you give the typical hookup excuse and are confident enough that they've bought it for now, but you're not especially assured that this will remain the case if Dirk decides he's not going to back off after all. 

You're exceedingly surprised when he actually keeps his word.

He does as he promised and stops marking you obnoxiously — where anybody can see, anyway. He declines to lay off of your thighs and stomach and shoulders, like he's some sort of big annoying dog who can't help but mark his territory incessantly. It's still a source of aggravation to you, but, it stops interfering with your work, so you let it go for now; you don't have the energy to invest in any petty campaigns against him at this point, and that's probably what he's banking on. Unfortunately, this time he gets to win.

... As if he doesn't always fucking win.

As the last few months roll on, you settle into a sort of complacent routine. The hours are still long and painful, but you get used to them again, and having someone at home with you again is pretty nice. You haven't had that since the first few years after you moved to Los Angeles with Jade to make it big — after she got picked up by Discovery for her wildlife documentary gig you ended up pretty much not seeing her at all during shoots, which landed you with many straight years of seasonal celibacy. You'd almost forgotten what it was like not to have pent up sexual frustration during a shoot.

You suppose the companionship isn't that bad either, but Dirk isn't exactly a champion at being an attentive boyfriend.

The relief you feel once you call the final cut of a shoot is always so fucking immense that it almost makes the agony preceding it worth it. You're fucking _done,_ you're free, you've got another whole year to not worry about shit other than the next script (which you'll put off as long as possible and then finish in one stress-filled month of work). You're fucking exhausted but almost deliriously happy and you can't wait to get home and do fuck-all for the rest of the day. 

"I'm fucking _done,_ " you announce as you bluster through the door of the apartment; Dirk is sprawled out on the sofa, as seems to be his permanent position, and sits up to look at you as you make your way over to the kitchen to dump your keys carelessly on the island.

"That's good," he says, and although he does his best to keep any notable inflection from his tone, you can tell he's nearly as relieved as you are. "Is that all the work you do for the year or what?"

"Basically," you answer, kicking off your shoes. You let them lay wherever they fall. "Got next movie script shit to do and some interviews to fly out to once we get into post, but once we have the wrap party it's done." You move over to the living area and hop over the back of the couch to stretch out over Dirk in a way you hope is as uncomfortable for him as possible.

He grunts in mild annoyance when he has to shift to relieve himself of your bony elbows, but he seems content enough not to complain when you settle into a more comfortable position with your head on his stomach and close your eyes.

"A party?" he eventually asks, absently carding his fingers through your hair. You're so tired you can't even be bothered to look up at him when he speaks.

"Mhmm. No, you don't get to come."

"I'm offended," he replies in a completely even deadpan. You can't tell whether it's a joke or that thing he does where he tells the truth but makes it sound like a joke so he gets to avoid all the consequences of being an asshole.

"You wouldn't like it anyway. Everybody's just going to be drunk and high and shit. Flagrant substance abuse everywhere you look, you wouldn't be able to handle it. You'd stick out like a big old stiff."

Dirk slaps you upside the head.

 

***

 

"Baby, I haven't seen you in mooooooonths," your mother whines. You sigh, shifting your phone to your other ear.

"Mom, I talk to you on the phone all the time."

"That's not the same as getting to see you! I miss you so much."

This never fucking ends. Year after year after year is the exact same fucking thing with her and she will never let it rest. All you can do is give her what she wants and hope it shuts her up long enough for you to regain your sanity. "Fine, how about you come to wrap? It's a plus one and I was gonna bring Aradia but —"

"Oh, that sounds great! It's been forever since I spoke to Owen and Ben. They're going to be there, right?"

"Yeah. Howie's hosting us this time. It's next Saturday at seven."

"Wonderful! You can pick me up at around six thirty and we can be fashionably late, all right?"

"Okay," you sigh, already preemptively exhausted by the prospect of the evening now that your mother is signed on to ruin everything. You were really looking forward to being able to actually get plastered that night.

You take your car and the last vestiges of your sanity out to Calabasas to pick up your mother. When you ring the doorbell to her house you're relieved to be greeted by your mother's already tipsily swaying form; you dread the occasional altercation with your stepfather when your mom proves too drunk and forgetful to warn him off answering the door.

You lead her out to your car and help her buckle in, and then painfully endure the rest of the 40 minute drive to Malibu while your mother talks your ear off about what she's been up to the last few months (exhausting more for the fact you've already heard this from her over the phone dozens of times). You have to stop five times along the way so she can piss, and by the time you get to Howie Mandel's house the party is well under way.

Navigating a party in which your mother is at attendance is one of perpetual anxiety and embarrassment. You watch her like a hawk, glaring intently at all of the men she tries to shamelessly flirt with (after about 20 seconds under your deathly intense stare, they tend to get the point and excuse themselves). You strictly regulate her intake of alcohol. It's really a lot like babysitting a child, but with more pissing and vomiting.

People actually don't try to bother you much during wrap. You've worked with a lot of these guys for years, but most of them are still too intimidated by you to actually try to strike up any conversation beyond the stray banal compliment and a "see you next year". You say hi to Howie when you catch him, but leave him alone in order to not exacerbate the constant state of mysophobic terror he spends in most of the event (you have no idea why he keeps having you guys over; you'd feel guilty enough to stop asking him to host if he weren't the one with the huge pool in Malibu). Of all the cast, only Ben and Owen really know you on more than a strictly professional level, but beyond an initial razzing, they're too busy schmoozing up the rest of the party to pay you any close attention.

It's for the best. Keeping track of your mom takes more energy than anybody would know.

After about an hour of lingering around the open bar and buffet in the house, the party begins to filter outdoors to the pool. You're sure as hell not planning on swimming — you're gonna grab a poolside chair and you're gonna sit there like a lifeguard, zealously tracking every movement that your mother makes. It is your familial duty.

Those plans are disrupted when the two of you step outside.

You watch in mesmerized horror as your mother reaches behind herself to tug on the zipper of her dress. The bright pink cloth falls away around her ankles, revealing the distressingly skimpy black bikini that threatens to burn your eyes out of their sockets.

"Mom," you hiss in disbelief, grabbing your mother by the arm to pull her back inside the house. You frantically glance around to see if anyone has noticed. "Oh my _god._ "

She looks at you like you just shat out a raccoon, wresting her arm from your grip. "What? It's a pool party, I brought a bikini."

"That's not a bikini, that's a fucking... That's a fucking string! Mom, _I can see your nipples!_ "

"Yes, Dave. I have nipples," your mother deadpans, crossing her arms over her chest. Under her breasts. Lifting them obscenely _practically up into your fucking face Jesus Lord in Heaven._ "I'm sorry you had to find out this way, sweetie."

You avert your eyes, your face burning in embarrassment. "Wow, I'm just... I'm going to stay inside."

"You're such a prude, Davey," she huffs, throwing up her arms. Your mom's tits jiggle and you want to die. "It's like you've never seen a woman before!"

You abscond away from your mother as quickly as you can manage, back into the house where you're alone apart from people moving to and from the bathrooms. In the absence of the ability to physically leave, you decide you'll depart mentally instead — you make a beeline straight for the bar and get yourself a whole fucking bottle of Jack Daniel's.

You usually don't drink when you bring your mother along, for obvious reasons, but the situation has reached a point where you absolutely cannot suffer it any longer. You'll just have to pass out in the pool house slash drunk tank with the rest of the crew until morning because you do not have the capacity to play designated driver tonight.

You get straight to work getting drunk as fuck, but even as the haze of alcohol seeps in you can't help but feel compelled to keep an eye on your mother anyway. You creep back over to the door to the outside patio and peer outside but the duration of whatever coherency you have left. 

_Everyone is fucking looking at your mom's breasts._

"Oh god, why," you mumble to yourself.

Unfortunately for you, everyone's already way drunker than you are or well on their way, and the party is just about reaching levels of rowdy obscenity that threatens to shatter your fragile constitution.

Once you see your entire camera crew licking alcohol off of your mother's exposed breasts, you have had enough. You are absolutely fucking done with life and you cannot suffer any further. You cannot even be witness to this. You take your bottle of Jack into a corner away from all the commotion to hide from the world and wish for death. Nobody bothers you because the party has ALREADY MOVED ON TO BEING ALL OVER YOUR MOM'S FUCKING BOOBS.

In a futile attempt to distract yourself, you open Pesterchum and survey your contacts list for a proper target for your whining.

turntechGodhead [TG] began pestering tentacleTherapist [TT]

TG: i hate mymom so much   
TT: No you don't.   
TG: i kno  
TG: she just showed me her boobs i should really hate her   
TT: ... What?   
TG: dude not like that  
TG: she showed the camera crew her boobs   
TT: Has our mother taken a recent shine to a career in the adult film industry?  
TT: If this is the case, please lie to me, and then mail me an envelope of anthrax so that I can die before the videos see the light of day.   
TG: no just the guys on it not the cameras  
TG: were at the wrap party  
TG: its liek a pool party she s  
TG: wearin a bikini thats WAY too fuckgni small for her  
TG: or she was shes now wearing it anymore  
TG: god damn these guys arnt gonna respect me at all anymore theyre licking my moms fucking boobs  
TG: yo johnny i need you to give me a low angle shot on this scene  
TG: no can do mr lalonde ive had your moms titties in my mouthh so now im basically your dad and dont have to do anything you tell me   
TT: Then stop them?   
TG: if i do that mom will be pissd  
TG: she WANTS them to lick her boobs   
TT: Wow.  
TT: You've got a real Sophie's Choice there.  
TT: My condolences.   
TG: hey fuck off  
TG: i dont wnt any of your sass ms movaved to the opposite side of the fuckin planet and left me all alone to shulder the massive burden of being our moms fuckin attetntion sponge   
TT: See, if you were smart, you would have done the same thing.   
TG: so i wouldnt becau se i love my mom and im not a total bitch  
TG: bitch   
TT: Thanks.   
TG: no dnt  
TG: do that   
TT: Do what?   
TG: that thing you do where you strattegicacly retract the barbs so i look like the assh ole who just scored a low blow against somebady who wasnt even fightng back   
TT: Heaven forbid. That would be such an inaccurate representation of you.   
TG: youre fuckin frosty as hell tonight siss   
TT: You think so?   
TG: yeah  
TG: anyway im gonna go get tehe res t of the way plastered cause youre hella kinds of harshing my buzz here with youre ice crean shit or whatever  
TG: ice queen  
TG: talk to you later   
TT: Have fun.

turntechGodhead [TG] ceased pestering tentacleTherapist [TT]

You sure has hell have something, though you're not sure "fun" is the word.

It doesn't take long for the booze to consume you, and the veritable maelstrom of bullshit your mom is starting keeps all the attention away from your secluded little shadowy corner apart from the commotion. Nobody bothers you and you're fucking glad because tonight you've got a sweet ass date with the alcohol fairy and you're eager as hell to go to that magical land of being blackout fucking drunk.

Eventually you get fucking bored just sitting there, though, but like fuck are you gonna dare stepping out into your mom's titty hurricane. Instead, you pick back up your phone and scour your contacts again — your heart skips a beat when it lands on a very rare sight indeed, and you frantically and very drunkenly text him a message.

turntechGodhead [TG] began pestering danknugzTokehard [DT]

TG: snoop  
TG: snoopy  
DT: waddup D!!  
TG: nothin  
TG: im at  
TG: im at rap  
TG: wrap  
TG: t  
TG: sory  
TG: the wrap party  
TG: for sbahj the mvovvie  
TG: i mean them vovie  
TG: the mvovie  
TG: *the mvovie  
TG: thats th ec rorrect spelling  
DT: thats cool man  
TG: yeah  
TG: btw your score wis amazing dude  
TG: cant wait til its all thru post  
DT: thx  
TG: hey  
TG: waht are you doing  
TG: right now  
DT: nmuch  
DT: bout 2 roll a fatty w/ some my homiez  
DT: gettn a choice blaze  
TG: wsh i had some weed  
TG: right now  
DT: checc this ishh  
danknugzTokehard [DT] sent turntechGodhead [TG] file "IMG_10253.jpg"   
DT: puff puff pass Uhearme!!!  
TG: hahahaha  
TG: yuo a  
TG: you re fukcing adorable  
DT: ha ha !  
TG: waht are you wearing  
TG: right now  
DT: jus a shirt n some jeans  
DT: got a picture a sponge bobb on it he a real fly nigga.....  
TG: cool  
DT: y??  
TG: no reason  
TG: im soooooooooooooo fckin drunk  
DT: ahahaha u crazy dogg!!  
DT: never met no body who party like the big D lalizzle  
DT: cept mayb your momma  
DT: hahaha  
TG: hahaha  
TG: yeah thats funny czu it sounds like it s some kind of dig at my mom but is actually litrerally true  
DT: mad respect for that lady she know how to nockem back...  
TG: yes my mom is realy good at being drunk  
TG: i am  
TG: too  
TG: i wish yoy were here  
TG: im durnk an  
TG: i miss you  
DT: man we gotta hang sometime  
DT: been 2 long!!!  
TG: yea  
TG: fuc k im horny  
DT: scopn out any hot bitches up in tha joint??  
TG: no  
TG: i cant get wi th any  
TG: bitches  
TG: anymore  
DT: shit man u get w/ a new girl?  
TG: kinda  
TG: hed probbly kill me if i fucked anoter girl haha  
DT: cool cool  
DT: still think u crazy 4 droppn jade tho dude  
DT: i dont know how u let her go tha piece ws chooooooooiiiiccee  
TG: tlel me about it  
TG: but shes alwasy in africca or austalua or some shit for her show inever saw her many more anyway  
TG: at leas t now i can get some dick  
DT: wat??  
TG: imean  
TG: get some wet on mydick  
TG: get my dick wet  
TG: haha  
DT: i hear u man  
TG: hey  
TG: hows your wife  
DT: she cool  
TG: oh ok  
TG: is youre mariage stil  
TG: married  
DT: haha ya we aight  
TG: oh  
TG: thats good iguess  
TG: you do nt think your gonna get divorce again  
DT: uhh...  
DT: i dont think so  
TG: snoopy  
DT: wats up man  
TG: i love syou  
DT: rite bacc at u my brotha  
DT: no homo :)  
TG: haha yeah  
TG: no homo  
TG: i   
TG: i should go  
DT: k  
DT: keep it real Uhearme!!  
TG: bye

turntechGodhead [TG] ceased pestering danknugzTokehard [DT]

_oh god why wont snoop dogg love you_

You're horny and now starved for positive attention, so you scour your contacts list for the next victim for your clumsy drunken solicitations. You land on Terezi and figure she'll probably be receptive; you practically flirt non-stop in all of your exchanges anyway, so your shitfaced brain supposes you may as well see how far you can push it.

turntechGodhead [TG] began pestering gallowsCalibrator [GC]

TG: hey pypope  
TG: lol  
TG: pypope   
GC: HELLO MR LALONDE  
GC: ARE YOU DRUNK? YOU SMELL DRUNK >:]   
TG: pyrope were talkign on fucking pesterchum you cant smell me   
GC: I CAN TOO SMELL YOU  
GC: YOU ARE SO DRUNK!   
TG: my drunkenness is totaly irelevan tot the fact that yiu cant even smell me  
TG: thats PHYSICACALLY impossible  
TG: were not eve n in the same romom  
TG: holy shit were not even in the same zip code ri ght now  
TG: youre making thinsg up   
GC: THEN HOW DID I KNOW YOU WERE DRUNK DAVE???   
TG: educa ted guess  
TG: you had like a 2 out o f 3 chance of bei ng right  
TG: bcuz im basically  
TG: salways drunk  
TG: bascically  
TG: look  
TG: i can do taht too  
TG: your wearing red panties   
GC: !!!  
GC: HOW DID YOU KNOW??   
TG: jfc i just told you hwo i knew  
TG: you like the color red and your a girl girls wear panties fuckin done  
TG: im not some fukicing master sleuth its basic statisttical extrarpolation   
GC: HOW DO I KNOW YOU HAVENT JUST BEEN LOOKING AT MY PANTIES? >;P   
TG: you havent showed them to me   
GC: YOU HAVENT ASKED >:]   
TG: hahahaha  
TG: not gonana lie  
TG: if you wernt like my lawer  
TG: lawyer  
TG: id give you the dick   
GC: IS THAT SO >:]   
TG: yeah  
TG: youer fucking crazy bu  
TG: t you have a great ass  
TG: id like  
TG: it deserves a lot fo dick   
GC: HOW MUCH DICK ARE WE TALKING??   
TG: the whole dick   
GC: THATS A LOT OF DICK DAVE   
TG: you dont even know pyrope  
TG: i ahve  
TG: so much dick,   
GC: HM  
GC: I NEVER KNEW YOU FELT THAT WAY   
TG: really  
TG: have we ever said one single thng to each other that wasnt a flirt   
GC: SOMETIMES WE DISCUSS YOUR TAXES   
TG: no im pretyy sure  
TG: even the tacxes  
TG: really sexy  
TG: caus you do tha t think with your tongue  
TG: when you talk  
TG: you move it around  
TG: like you talk with youre tongeu  
TG: hey  
TG: y  
TG: you wanna have like  
TG: a threeway  
TG: or something   
GC: WITH KARKAT???   
TG: waht the fuck no  
TG: man how did that asshole eve n get in this convo   
GC: DIDNT YOU KNOW  
GC: >:?   
TG: know what   
GC: I AM DATING KARKAT DAVE   
TG: what  
TG: what  
TG: pyrope why  
TG: when  
TG: how   
GC: WEVE BEEN TOGETHER ALMOST HALF A YEAR NOW!   
TG: shit  
TG: seriosusly   
GC: IM SORRY I THOUGHT IT WAS OBVIOUS   
TG: man you can do so mcuhc better than that  
TG: shitty butt shit  
TG: if i knew y ou were dtf youer clients  
TG: i woulda  
TG: shit   
GC: WELL  
GC: IF MY SITUATION EVER CHANGES...........  
GC: >:]  
GC: > :]  
GC: >:]   
TG: sorry its too late now  
TG: i cant slep with any thing vantas has put his tiny litle dick in like asuming hes even long engouh to make it past y  
TG: your labia   
GC: HE IS   
TG: ok  
TG: then your vag ina is basicaly likw  
TG: youve got all kind of  
TG: like  
TG: its all gross now   
GC: <:[   
TG: ok im sorry im sure you have a nice vagina   
GC: THANK YOU DAVE   
TG: no problem  
TG: sometimes i think abuot eating you out while im talking to you   
GC: I THINK THIS JUST GOT REALLY WEIRD   
TG: yeah it did  
TG: ac tually im pretty sure it  
TG: was already really wierd   
GC: KINDA  
GC: I PROBABLY SHOULDNT FLIRT WITH YOU WHILE I HAVE A BOYFRIEND >:[   
TG: yeah  
TG: i shouldnt either  
TG: can we jus agree to delete this log and  
TG: pretend this never happened   
GC: YES THAT SOUNDS GOOD   
TG: ok  
TG: im gonna go get more drunk and hit on somebdody else now   
GC: OK GOOD LUCK DAVE  
GC: BYE   
TG: by  
TG: e

turntechGodhead [TG] ceased pestering gallowsCalibrator [GC]

You're sporting an impressive stiffy for your degree of drunkenness and you have decided that you need to get laid. This, you suppose, is an improvement over thinking about your mom's breasts.

But now you're thinking about your mom's breasts while you have a boner and you are _so fucking done_

You take another swig from your bottle of Jack before you clumsily open a dialogue with what you intended to be Dirk and fire off some very direct messages.

turntechGodhead [TG] began pestering tentacleTherapist [TT]

TG: i am g o  
TG: i am gonna fuck th eSHIT out of you   
TT: Pardon?   
TG: you he,ard me  
TG: its  
TG: im gonna  
TG: your ass   
TT: What about my ass?   
TG: im gonna fuck it   
TT: Really?   
TG: yeah   
TT: How do you plan to accomplish that?   
TG: by fucking it   
TT: That may be difficult, as I am presently located on the opposite side of the country.   
TG: waht  
TG: howd you why  
TG: why are yuo in there   
TT: I live here.   
TG: but i justr  
TG: oh  
TG: is this nmy siter,   
TT: Your what?   
TG: my sitsr  
TG: sistre  
TG: sits  
TG: my rose  
TG: ok godt it   
TT: Yes, Dave.   
TG: shit yo urtpye just like him  
TG: type  
TG: and the ts  
TG: tts  
TG: confuse  
TG: what i am  
TG: ewait   
TT: ...   
TG: salami

turntechGodhead [TG] ceased pestering tentacleTherapist [TT]

turntechGodhead [TG] began pestering tentacleTherapist [TT]

TG: oop  
TG: ras  
TG: rs e are yuuou ther e   
TT: Yes.   
TG: ok  
TG: i dra nk too much  
TG: waht time is it   
TT: It would be 11:00 PM for you now.   
TG: wo realy  
TG: its so ea rky but  
TG: early  
TG: but i a i  
TG: i thnk i shouldg  
TG: go home   
TT: That's probably a good idea.   
TG: wai t i cnat  
TG: im drive dont   
TT: What?   
TG: i cant dirive  
TG: im dank  
TG: drunk  
TG: im gona have to slep  
TG: at h  
TG: for me  
TG: i cant even  
TG: jj[  
TG: rose i fel on mthe for  
TG: the floor   
TT: Would you like me to text Aradia to come get you?   
TG: noh tank u   
TT: Alright.  
TT: Perhaps you should just have a little nap, then.   
TG: yea  
TG: tx  
TG: im going to  
TG: close eys  
TG: by   
TT: Goodnight, Dave.

tentacleTherapist [TT] ceased pestering turntechGodhead [TG]

 

***

 

You wake up the next morning — that is to say, the next afternoon — with the most horrible hangover of your life. Your immediate reaction is to bury your head under your pillows and hide from the glaring light filtering in through the window, but you quickly discover that there are no pillows and you're passed out in a puddle of your own vomit on the floor of Howie Mandel's pool house.

You _wish_ you didn't remember anything from last night.

With a laborious groan, you pull yourself up off the floor. Every part of your body aches miserably, and when you cast a glance around the house, it seems you're not the only one — some of the other party goers managed to at least find a couch to pass out on, but most of them are either still asleep or as out of it as you are.

"Where's my mom," you rasp out to the nearest conscious person you can find. You immediately recognize him as one of the cameramen who were macking on your mom's boobies. You're incredibly tempted to fire him on the spot.

"Uhh, over there," he says, quickly gesturing to the staircase to the second level of the house. Your mother is passed out on the final step, wearing somebody else's shirt. You give the cameraman an incredibly ungrateful look and he takes that as a cue to get the hell out of dodge.

You limp over to your mother and gently rouse her out of her sleep. It looks like she's got it just as bad as you; she opens her eyes only to immediately squeeze them shut again, whining miserably. "Oh goooodddd."

"I know," you tell her. You lean down to help her up to her feet, and she has to lean most of her weight on you to stand. "Let's go home. Do you know where your stuff is?"

It turns out she _doesn't_ know where her stuff is. You try to argue that you should just leave, you can buy her a new dress and shoes, but she's adamant you recover everything she's lost, so you take her around the property in search of her misplaced items. You find both her heels floating in the pool, her dress under one of the patio chairs, and her purse slung up in a tree. You have to coax that down with a pool stick.

Thankfully everything in her purse seems to have remained intact, so you're able to guide her back to the car. The light hurts her eyes so you give her your sunglasses, even if it makes your own migraine even worse.

For once, you drive your mother home in silence.

 

***

 

You arrive back at your apartment pretty late. You're fucking exhausted and sore and all you want is an extremely long shower; you're still caked in vomit on top of it all, which is certainly not an attractive quality.

You fumble with your keys to unlock the door to your apartment and stagger into the entry area. You discover Dirk out in the living room when you emerge from the hall, stretched out on the couch watching some shitty horse movie — if he notices you enter he doesn't say anything.

You really want to head straight to the bathroom, but seeing him gives you pause. Now that filming's really fucking over, the reality of it all just sort of hits you. You wonder back about some of the things he's said and feel compelled to ask him.

"Hey," you tentatively greet him. He gives a shrug of his shoulder in the most half-assed acknowledgment he can manage, and you'd have missed it if you didn't know to look for it.

You make your way over to the couch and perch yourself on the armrest, looking down at him in his spot. He doesn't look away from the television. "So. Everything's completely done with now."

"Yeah."

"I'll still have some work to do overseeing post, but I'll be able to stick around a lot more now."

"I know. You told me." Measured. Unaffected. Still doesn't look at you.

"Are you... planning on moving back out?"

Dirk stiffens. That finally won his attention; he turns to you with an inquisitive expression. He doesn't even comment on your conspicuous alcovomit smell and matching appearance. "What?"

"When you agreed to move in, I said you could move out after filming if you wanted to," you mention with a casual shrug. Gotta make it seem like you don't give a shit or you're the pussy. "Do you want to?"

He pauses before answering with an evasive question of his own. "Do you want me to?"

You're almost surprised by how little you actually have to think about your answer. "No," you quickly reply.

Dirk looks back to the TV. There's a moment of uneasy silence between you before he responds again, his tone carefully deadpan. "Nah, then. Too much hassle to move all my stuff back out."

"Okay, then," you say. You lick your dry lips, and you immediately regret the effort. Even your tongue is parched. "So you want to stay for good?"

"If you want me here," he reluctantly answers. "I guess."

"I do."

"Fine, then."

And that's that. You linger for a moment longer, watching him carefully as he resolutely looks anywhere but at you, before you eventually slide off the arm of the couch to head to the bathroom. When you step into the shower, you're relieved in more ways than one.


	14. Chapter 14

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> heads up for increased presence of blood, injury, sexual violence, intensely dubious consent, physical abuse, emotional abuse, chemical bondage

The funny thing about satisfaction is that the goalposts have a way of moving themselves.

The moment you have everything you want, you need something more. It's never enough. You're the most discontent when you're your happiest — the expectation of fulfillment makes the little things you can't have feel like enormous injustices. And you have not lead a life where things are often denied to you. Or ever, really. It's sort of a wonder you didn't end up even more of an insufferably spoiled cock than you already are.

And your literal cock, by all accounts, _feels_ pretty damn spoiled. You don't think you've ever had a relationship where the sex is as good as it is with Dirk — but it's limited, in a way. With all of the other people you've ever been with, the raw physical sensation may not have been able to compare, but you've never been in a position where you feel so thoroughly subordinated and ultimately... irrelevant. He uses you, and gets you off to the fullest extent in the process of taking what he wants, but he never does anything _for_ you or _because_ you wanted it — and he doesn't _care_ about what you want or need. He does what he wants and nothing more and by it's some sort of freak accident of luck that bringing you to any orgasm at all happens to fall under "what he wants". It is invariably about him in the end.

Everyone else you've slept with had been so eager to please — you could've gotten them to do anything you wanted to, probably, were you the type to push. But Dirk won't do _anything_ he doesn't actively desire to do, no matter how little an inconvenience it'd be for him to do so, no matter how far you yourself will bend over backwards to accommodate what _he_ wants, and it makes you feel powerless on a level beyond basic submission. 

So when you find yourself with something new you want to do, it's a Problem. Some things are more of a Problem than others; sometimes the things you want to do also happen to fall under Things Dirk Wants To Do, which means you get to do them, and sometimes they don't, but you can live without it.

But the fact of the matter is that your awful shithead boyfriend has a very nice ass and you are a man and you want to put your penis in it. You know before even posing the question that the answer would be a resounding no, but you want it enough that you feel like it's worth pushing the issue — or maybe just in principle, in general, in response to the remorseless disregard he has for you and the things you desire and the basic courtesy of reciprocity.

You have a feeling it's going to be a long haul.

You don't go into it from a very advantageous position. In fact, you first go into it in bed, beneath him, halfway through the process of undress, on a poorly thought-out and lust-addled impulse.

"Let me fuck you," you breathe out raggedly the first moment you find reprieve.

At once, Dirk stills. You stop and look to him, studying his expression — he's predictably reluctant to give anything away, and before you can process anything he immediately affixes a smug look to shroud his reaction. "Is that so," he replies, deadpan, boring a hole into your skull with the intensity of his returned stare.

You grow uneasy beneath his scrutiny and shift uncomfortably, to the furthest extent his pinning weight will allow. You're not sure exactly how to respond to such a statement, or how to proceed at all. Given Dirk's penchant for making even the most trivial things into a federal fucking issue you figure you probably should have prepared some sort of plan before springing this on him. "Um, yeah. I mean, it's like, a dude's gotta use his own dick at least once in a while."

There's a moment of awkward silence before Dirk replies, deliberately obtuse, "You use your dick plenty."

"You know what I meant, shitlord," you sigh. You make an attempt at pushing him over onto his back, but his muscles stiffen and his jaw sets and he remains distinctly unmoved. "Come on."

Dirk draws his brow into an expression somewhere between confusion and constipation, resolutely refusing to acquiesce. For some reason, he feels compelled to negotiate and force you to logically justify yourself. "What's even the point? My dick is bigger than yours. It's more efficient for both of us if I fuck you."

"What? Dude, that's not the point at all."

"Then what _is_ the point?" he demands, an almost defensive tone edging into his voice. You raise an eyebrow and he immediately fortifies the wall, wiping his expression clean — but it's too late for him. You jump at the opportunity.

"You've never done it before, have you?"

Dirk looks caught in a confused mess of indignation, pride and embarrassment. He takes a moment to shift through his emotional conflict before returning with a tone that comes off as self-assuredly smug. "Nah. I don't get fucked."

Time to try a new tactic. You force the bitterest laugh you can muster — you immediately catch his facade falter, but he's quick to recompose himself. He sits up to straddle you, sparing you some of his crushing weight, and glares down at you defensively.

"The fuck are you laughing about?"

Well, it seems like shame is a fairly effective strategy. It's good to see he's not the only one who can play his shitty game. "You're a _virgin,_ " you mock him.

"What?" he says incredulously. "Kid, I've fucked more dudes than you've met in your entire life."

"Yeah, but not in _your_ ass —"

He huffs and moves to push off of you, but you quickly lurch forward to grab back ahold of him. He loses his balance and topples back onto the bed, and you shift to persuasion while you grapple with him for control. "Dude, I am like, the king of ass," you grit out, trying to wrestle him onto the mattress. He's not putting up much of a fight, but you're still losing. "I could legally — _huff_ — declare myself a pirate with all the booty I've plundered. I sail the sea of shit like a —"

Dirk stops struggling to make a face.

"Ok the point is I can make it good for you," you say, hurriedly changing the course of your shit schooner. "I even learned to do it with girls and they don't even _have_ prostates. Trust me, it won't hurt at all."

For a short moment, you let yourself get your hopes up. He stares you right in the eye, expression steeled, and pauses, as if just to let the anticipation build — but his answer is predictable as ever. "No."

He pushes you off successfully this time and slides off the bed; you try to grab at him again, but this time he really doesn't want to be caught, so you don't have a chance. You make another desperate play. "Come on. You know it can be good," you plead. May as well clear the begging base. "Just look at what you do to me. I love it. You'll love it too if you just —"

Dirk spares you a dismissive glance over his shoulder as he goes about retrieving his discarded clothing from the floor. "If you love it so much then we can just keep doing it that way."

You groan. "Seriously — all right, _please?_ Look. I'm begging. This is some degrading ass shit. You're into degrading me. You get off on that. I'm being degraded, come get off."

He pauses and turns back to you to give you the most exasperated look imaginable. "If you want it, then take it."

"What?" you laugh. You're not sure whether the statement itself or the fact it's not an outright refusal is more confusing.

"If you want to fuck me, then you have to work for it," Dirk declares, positioning his hands on his hips in a manner that manages to both be defiantly sassy and display his obviously superior musculature. "I'm not going to just roll over and give it up like some pussy fag bitch."

On top of feeling mildly insulted, you're astounded by the absurdity of the suggestion — or would be if this kind of infantile garbage weren't exactly his MO. "What, you want me to — to _fight_ you for your ass? Dude, this is ridiculous, I can't —"

"Then you don't get to fuck me."

"This isn't even fair, you're way stronger than me."

" _Then you don't get to fuck me._ "

You gape at him in dumbfounded bewilderment. Are you dating a fucking twelve year old boy? "I agree to do so much fucked up shit for you and you won't even do this one thing," you say. You don't even know why you're still trying to argue with him.

Dirk doesn't either, apparently, because he deigns to ignore your statement to resume putting back on his clothes. You stare daggers at him as he does, simmering in aimless frustration — the negative energy wells up in you until you're stricken by an impulse. You fidget restlessly as his finishes buttoning the fly of his jeans. You wait until he starts to pull his shirt over his head and move.

As quickly as you can manage, you lurch from your spot on the bed in your best effort to tackle your asshole brother to the ground. Your best effort proves to be phenomenally pathetic, though, because in the half a second of time between when you start to move and when you connect, he's already gotten his shirt on and uses his now free arms to mercilessly deflect your attack. He carelessly shoves you straight off and you collide with the bedside night stand like a rag doll full of bricks; the lamp is knocked clean off and connects painfully with your head before falling to shatter against the ground. The protruding metal of the drawer handles stabs into and scrapes deep gashes into your back as you slide against it to the ground, which is graciously littered with broken ceramic by the time you reach it. The additional sensation of sharp shards digging into your skin exacerbates your panic.

"What the _fuck?_ " you curse as you scramble to relocate yourself out of the general vicinity of the broken lamp pieces. Dirk certainly makes no attempt to assist you; he stands where he was, arms folded, and regards you with the same patronizingly detached expression he always has on his smug fucking face. God forbid he display anything approaching _empathy_ or _remorse_ for the litany of atrocious shit he does to you. When he makes no verbal reply, all you can do is reiterate, " _What the **fuck**?_ "

Dirk gives a little half shrug. "You attacked me."

"You _told_ me to," you grit out. You shakily pull yourself to your feet; you're bleeding in several places and your head is sore, but you're not sure whether the tremors are from the physical pain or your anger. 

"I never said I wasn't gonna put up a fuckin' fight."

You don't even know what to say to him. You have to pick a piece of lamp out of your leg. You _liked_ that lamp. "Get out," you tell him. Your tone of voice is surprisingly measured, practically conversational.

Dirk doesn't move to leave immediately. He uncrosses his arms, furrows his brow; when you meet his continued presence with an angered stare, he poses a hesitant question. "For good?" He seems reluctant to even ask; after all, if he'd simply assumed otherwise, it's not like you'd have the balls to correct him, right?

You have to think about it. It really probably should be for good. When you honestly fucking _look_ at this guy, at your life with him, you feel fucking crazy for having ever agreed to so much as talk to him in the first place, let alone allow things to proceed to the point where you have to _make_ this decision. That this is even a fucking decision at _all_. But you're a fucking idiot who's never thought with his god damn rational mind in his life, so when you reply it's with the words of a fool and a moron. "... No. Just for... maybe a few hours. I have to clean this up."

He seems relieved. He shouldn't be the one who is relieved. He should have to deal with fucking consequences for his actions but like fuck are you ever going to find the spine.

"Okay," Dirk answers. An uncomfortable sickness wells in your stomach and you don't even understand why you feel anything you feel. He leaves after an awkward silent moment more shared between you, and then you alone bend down to pick up the pieces. 

 

***

 

The weeks roll by and you forgot why you were ever mad in the first place.

That seems to always be how it is with him. It would be incredibly generous to call Dirk anything approaching "kind" or "compassionate", but on most days, you can deal. You've acclimated to his brand of assholery to the point where you can shrug most of it off, or convince yourself it's a facet of his pathological commitment to insincerity, that he doesn't really mean the things he says or does or doesn't do. It doesn't faze you, most of the time. So you get complacent in the cycle; he'll do something shitty to you and then you'll forget, because the sex and whatever meager companionship he offers you are immediate and his worst displays of abhorrent disregard for your wellbeing drift further away with the passing of time. 

And, as ever, your penis finds a way to override any small sliver of a claim to sense you may have had.

As SBaHJ gets deeper into post, the number of interviews and TV appearances on your schedule ramp up, and with it your travel time — and the amount of time you spend not getting laid. Which, naturally, leads to you spending more time thinking about getting laid. And when you think about getting laid you think about getting laid via your penis in Dirk's ass.

It almost verges on an obsession. Not a very practical one, given how utterly obstinate and beyond reason Dirk is about anything he doesn't want to do — but he _did_ technically give you an OK. An OK you're sure he gave specifically under the assumption that you could never actually manage it, but it's _some_ form of consent. And he's stubborn enough that you think maybe, if you _did_ figure out some method to physically overpower him, even if it was sort of cheating, he'd be too afraid of looking like a wimp for complaining that you successfully did the thing he _told_ you to do. 

So you make a plan. You make a plan on the internet with your credit card.

Your plan arrives in the mail two days later. You paid for one day shipping so you're kind of annoyed and consider pursuing a refund, but you decide to worry about that after you've successfully scored with your flawless plan. 

You're oddly nervous as you stare down at his prone form stretched out across your bed; he's spectacularly good at occupying space, which is beyond aggravating for anyone forced to suffer the indignity of sharing a bed with the fuck. It's hard to see in the pre-dawn darkness, but with a close enough eye, you can make out the even rise and fall of his chest as you loom above him. You grip the handcuffs tightly in your hands as to not cause any noisy jingling when you move.

As carefully as you can manage, you begin to climb up onto the bed. He shifts slightly when your knee dips the mattress, and you freeze, but after several seconds of paralyzed anticipation it seems he remained asleep all the same. Your heart is beating in your chest far more quickly than is probably reasonable as you pull yourself the rest of the way onto the mattress.

This guy has fucking ungodly reflexes so you half expect him to spring up the moment you touch him. Nearly shaking, you reach out one of your hands to his wrist — your fingers brush against his skin and you jump like some sort of easily spooked animal and feel twice as ridiculous when he doesn't even react.

You're lucky enough that he's laid out close enough to the headboard that you won't have to move his body substantially to cuff him to it. You gently take hold of his arm and move it up towards the slats of the headboard, and then do the same with the other when he proves to have remained undisturbed. You're actually getting kind of excited now — this shit might actually work, provided he doesn't decide to go as far as ripping out your entire fucking headboard to free himself. Which you... wouldn't put past him, but you're being optimistic. 

All that's left are the cuffs. You pick them up from where you left them on the bed, hyperaware of any noise you might make, and slowly, slowly edge forward to your mark. This is it. You're gonna do it. You're winning, you're gonna cuff the fuck out of him and then there'll be nothing he can do to stop you from wrecking the fuck out of his sweet ass. A triumphant grin spreads across your face as you inch forward, so fucking close, you've got it around his wrist and all you have to do is close it and —

And then the jig is fucking up. Before you even know what's hit you he's snatched the cuffs away and he's slamming you down against the bed beneath him, his fists gripped tightly and unforgivingly around your wrists. It fucking hurts and you're winded and he grinds his crotch against yours with a merciless force that causes you to cry out in bewildered surprise.

"You think you're so fucking clever, you little shit," he growls, a sadistic grin spread across his face.

You thrash against him, but his grip is utterly resolute and he's got your thighs stuck spread apart and every movement you make only causes you to grind painfully, pleasurably against him, and you've already got one hell of an erection going on just from this brief stint of fantasy and stimulation. He laughs patronizingly at you, like he's just so amused by how hard you're trying. "Fuck you, come on, just let me fuck you," you plead when trying to fight your way out doesn't work.

He moves to straddle your waist, freeing your wrists to dangle the handcuffs over your head tauntingly. "After this? I don't fucking think so." You try to grab for them, but he successfully escapes your grasp. "These things aren't even padded. You tryin' to get me to slit my wrists open?"

"What, no —"

"Kinky little bastard."

"I'm not, it was for —"

"Shut the fuck up," he reprimands you, and promptly descends to attack your mouth with his lips and teeth.

Well, even if you're not going to get to fuck his ass this time, you do have a rather powerful boner to contend with, so you suppose a normal fuck as a consolation prize won't be so bad. You relax and let it happen, kissing him back in earnest, spreading your legs for him to settle back between them and rut against you. When you try to wrap your arms around his neck he stops you, pinning your wrists again — and when you realize what he's doing it's too late.

"Ugh, really?" you groan as he closes a handcuff around one of your wrists, but you don't make any honest attempt to fight him off.

"If you're so intent on using these things, you can wear them."

"Whatever," you sigh. What the hell, it's not like you've never done a little bondage before. "Fine. Just hurry up."

Dirk obliges, slipping the other cuff and its short chain through the slat of the headboard. You willingly offer up your other hand and he secures the second cuff around it, leaving you rather uncomfortably restrained on your back. You do your best to relax, testing the bonds — they dig into your skin pretty painfully, but it'll be over soon enough. "Okay, I —"

And then Dirk gets up and walks out of the fucking room.

It takes several seconds for your brain to process what just occurred, as if it weren't willing to believe that anyone could be so much of a colossal fucking cock — but oh, no, what were you thinking? You could never fucking put something past Dirk because he is a fucking unrepentant asshole the likes of which you have never seen!! Wow!! Suddenly you are so incredibly fucking mad you want to yell, which you do.

"Oh my fucking GOD, are you fucking _kidding_ me??? You can't fucking just leave me here — come back here, holy shit! Oh my god, I hate you so fucking much, you piece of shit, you fucking shit garbage trash, I'm going to _kill_ you if you don't — oh my god!"

Regardless of how much you holler, though, Dirk does not come to release you. Instead, you watch him sit down in the living room, turn on the television, and then resolutely ignore everything you shout at him.

It gradually sinks in that he's fucking serious. This isn't a cute little prank, he's completely fucking seriously going to leave you here handcuffed to the bed with no way to get out, for god knows how long. You honestly wouldn't fucking put it past him to leave you there until you fucking starve to death and a little bit of panic seeps in with your anger and humiliation.

You pull at your bonds, but it's a futile effort that only serves to cause the metal to dig even more deeply into the raw skin of your wrists. You try to slip them down to at least move them off the parts of your skin they've already aggravated, but they're too tight for that to do any good. You wince, at once regretting everything you've ever done in your whole life. You hate him you hate him you hate him you fucking _hate that stupid fucking motherfucker and you're never going to forgive him for this bullshit._

"Aradia!" you eventually shout, forced to stoop to the lowest level possible in pursuit of your own degradation. "ArrrraaaaAAADDIIAAA!"

Dirk laughs at you loudly from the living room, and then turns the volume of the television up.

You keep shouting, and shouting, and for a while you're convinced you're going to be stuck there forever. Thankfully, though, after you've just about shouted yourself hoarse, you eventually hear the door to the service elevator open as Aradia lets herself in. You're fucking saved.

"Aradia, I'm in the bedroom!" you yell, and shortly after your assistant pokes her head through the door to behold the spectacle of your humiliation.

You don't know whether the fact she's utterly unsurprised says more about her or you.

"God, thank you, I left the key in — in the bedside table, in the drawer," you say, gesturing at it desperately with your head.

"How did this happen?" Aradia asks as she walks over to pick up the key, and then back around you unlock the cuffs. You give her your most grateful look when your hands are finally freed, rubbing your raw wrists.

"I, uh. Well, Dirk cuffed me to the bed. And... left me there."

"I see."

"Dirk is sort of an asshole if you didn't know."

"Yes, I picked up on that."

You release a sigh and sit up in the bed, now spectacularly self-conscious about your state of undress. Which Aradia doesn't give a toss about, but the shame permeates regardless. "Um. Thanks. Don't tell anybody this happened."

"Wasn't planning to," she succinctly replies, and then leaves you to your business to return to her apartment. Dirk pays neither her nor you any mind.

You groan once you're left alone and slide out of the bed. The pain in your wrists from the cuffs proves to be aggravatingly persistent — you now understand first hand why he was so pissed about you springing them on him, though you would've much preferred a more humane method of education. Rubbing them angrily, you walk back into the living area, where Dirk remains unmoving in his spot in front of the television.

"You're a fucking dick," you spit. You are well aware that this is news to absolutely nobody, but you're intent on thoroughly reminding him.

Dirk's only reply is a short, forced bark of laughter. Anger flares up in your chest like fucking clockwork.

"No, really, you fucking —"

"Calm down, it was a harmless prank," Dirk dismisses you, avoiding your gaze to flip through the channels on the television absently.

"Like fuck it was, look at this shit," you complain, moving around the sofa to block his view of the TV and shove your practically fucking lacerated wrist in his face.

He raises an eyebrow at you. "You were gonna lock _me_ up in those, dunno what the fuck you're bitching about."

"I didn't know it would be this bad! _You_ knew it would be this bad and you did it anyw—"

"Oh god, stop whining."

"I'm not whining! You fucking _left_ me there and —"

"I would've let you out eventually."

"Would you have?" you breathe, growing increasingly upset over how much he just _doesn't fucking give a shit_ about anything you're saying to him. "I don't fucking know with you. Like I seriously wouldn't put it past you to let me fucking die and that's like, holy _shit_ dude, do you have any idea how fucking crazy it is that I'd even _think_ that?"

"Yeah, it sure sounds like a crazy load of shit to me." You open your mouth to angrily retort but he cuts you off. "So, what, am I supposed to feel sorry about some sort of imaginary crime that you think I could maybe be _possibly_ capable of doing even though I didn't, and told you I wouldn't?" he lazily drawls. "Seems like your problem to me."

You falter. You're flustered and angry and upset and he just looks up at you with this even expression and nothing you've said has even fucking cracked the wall. You search for something to say but nothing comes, shame welling in your stomach as his expectant stare burns a hole in your chest and you have nothing. He makes you feel like an idiot for caring at all.

"Well?" he asks after a tense standstill. When you can't manage more than to gape at him, he tries to push you out of the way with his foot. You stumble and only barely catch your balance. "If you're done, move over. I'm trying to watch this."

With nothing more to say, you retreat to your office and throw yourself into your work.

 

***

 

TG: ok lets say i wanted to do something stupid   
EB: wait, are you implying you've EVER done something that wasn't stupid?   
TG: shut up  
TG: anyway lets say im not just saying i want to do something stupid im going to do something stupid  
TG: medically stupid   
EB: uh?   
TG: that i need your medical opinion on   
EB: well, i'm only a med student.  
EB: i dunno if you wanna take my word on something if it's serious.   
TG: nah its no big deal  
TG: anyway i want to drug my boyfriend so hell let me fuck him in the butt   
EB: ... dave.   
TG: what   
EB: rape is KIND OF a big deal.   
TG: what its not rape  
TG: not really   
EB: that sounds pretty damn rapey to me!   
TG: no its not he told me to  
TG: kind of   
EB: "kind of".   
TG: ok well he told me i could fuck his butt if i could "take it"  
TG: ie beat him up  
TG: except hes kinda swole so i dont have a fucking chance   
EB: swole?   
TG: god dammit egbert do you even lift  
TG: cut  
TG: ripped  
TG: beefy  
TG: muscled  
TG: STRONG   
EB: ok, ok, i get it.   
TG: good  
TG: anyway he has taken me to the gun show on multiple occasions and the results were not in my favor  
TG: im gonna need some help if im ever gonna slip him the pickle   
EB: maybe the fact he gave you such an unrealistic option means he doesn't want to do it at all?   
TG: idk maybe  
TG: but he could also just be saying that because hes a fucking insecure basket case and he wants to do it but will only allow himself to have it under THE MOST HARDCORE CIRCUMSTANCES POSSIBLE  
TG: he thinks getting fucked in the ass will make him a fag or something   
EB: but isn't he already a...  
EB: uh.   
TG: a what   
EB: the thing you said.   
TG: what  
TG: a fag   
EB: i don't think i should say that word?   
TG: god youre a fag  
TG: anyway yeah hes a huge gay  
TG: hes way gayer than i am he makes this hideous face every time he sees a vagina its fucking hilarious  
TG: like have you ever seen a dog get fed broccoli it is EXACTLY like that  
TG: anyway he has issues with manliness or whatever  
TG: whatever the dudes fucking ancient and grew up in texas its not a surprise hes got a shitload of  
TG: dang what would rose call it  
TG: """internalized homophobia"""   
EB: this sounds like something that'd be better resolved through talking than actually beating him up or drugging him.   
TG: ahahahahhahaha dude you think i havent tried  
TG: fuck him hes stupid and old and terrible and i basically hate his stupid guts right now  
TG: i dont care what he really thinks about it this would totally fall under what he said on a technicality and i know he has way too much stubborn pride to bitch about it even if its not really want he wants  
TG: so id get what i want and get away with it AND get to spite him  
TG: that sounds like a win fucking win to me john   
EB: well, i at least HOPE you know how awful and mean that also completely sounded.   
TG: no shit  
TG: but hes awful and mean too  
TG: he deserves way more than a surprise dicking   
EB: why don't you just break up with him if he's so terrible instead of playing into some weird escalating cruelty circus?   
TG: cause hes unbelievably hot   
EB: that's it?  
EB: you officially forfeit your right to complain about any of my relationships ever again.   
TG: ok there are other reasons i guess but theyre even stupider than that so why even list them  
TG: also if you think that hypocrisy is in ANY WAY going to impede our wholesome family tradition of me vigorously shitting on your girlfriends you are intensely deluded john   
EB: sigh.  
EB: ok, just tell me what you were planning to do.   
TG: alright i was looking into like muscle relaxants i can order illegally off the internet or something  
TG: i mean im assuming that those things will relax muscles  
TG: how about tubocurarine can i get that   
EB: what??? no!  
EB: dave, that is a REALLY bad idea.   
TG: wait why   
EB: because it'll also... stop him from breathing?  
EB: DTC is used during surgeries and stuff.   
TG: oh   
EB: unless you plan to also intubate him that'd BASICALLY be a one way ticket to murder town.   
TG: how do you do that   
EB: dave, do you even know what intubation is?   
TG: uh   
EB: it's that thing where the doctors stick a tube down your throat so they can make you breathe and not die.   
TG: oh  
TG: ok i probably shouldnt try to do that   
EB: no, you really shouldn't!  
EB: doctors don't even really use DTC anymore. it's like the worst possible thing you could have picked.   
TG: yes see this is why im asking you  
TG: ok well there has to be something thats milder than that  
TG: i guess i dont even need to paralyze him just weaken him enough that i can actually take him down  
TG: i dont wanna fuck a dead fish   
EB: oh my god...   
TG: ok what about flexeril  
TG: it says the side effects include muscle weakness and drowsiness would that work   
EB: are you just sending me names of drugs you found on wikipedia??   
TG: yeah   
EB: i'm not gonna be your murder accomplice, dave.   
TG: yeah thats why you should tell me what drug to give him so he doesnt die   
EB: why don't you just get him drunk like a normal person???   
TG: hes fucking straight edge or something he doesnt drink   
EB: this is so dumb.  
EB: i'm leaving.   
TG: john no wait   
EB: what?   
TG: john you have to stay  
TG: you wont be able to live with yourself if you leave and then i end up giving him some murder drug  
TG: ill be all like  
TG: john  
TG: if only youd stayed and helped me find the right drug  
TG: i wouldnt have killed my boyfriend  
TG: "im way too gorgeous to be in prison" ill say as a single tear escapes from behind my prison issue shades  
TG: subtly implying the entire cell block has already had its way with my sweet ass  
TG: and then youll totally feel guilty  
TG: forever   
EB: you are a really shitty brother.  
EB: is it too late to send you back to the brother factory to get a replacement that isn't so shitty?   
TG: yes  
TG: now shut up and help me find a drug

 

***

 

"What's this?"

Dirk looks up at you from his seat on the couch, his expression tinged with mild exasperation at your body's inconvenient blockage of his House Hunters rerun.

"This fuck does it look like?" you say, shoving the plate you're holding with its shoddily composed taco into his face.

He just stares at you, confused, before reluctantly accepting the plate. You take a seat a comfortable distance away from him on the opposite half of the couch, and do your best to make it look like you're watching the TV and not monitoring Dirk's actions out of the corner of your eye.

He doesn't touch it for a good while. "... Is this poisoned?" he eventually asks, his face contorted into a comically suspicious expression.

You look back to him with surprise equal parts feigned and genuine. "No," you scoff, before quickly diverting your gaze to the television with what you hope is casual dismissal. "I decided to do something nice for you, that's all."

And apparently _that_ is cause enough for paranoia. His eyes narrow.

"What's this abo—"

"Just fucking eat it," you snap, forcing a patronizing smile onto your face.

One of Dirk's eyebrows shoots up. You star him down, glare intense. He looks between you and the food in his hands. "Jesus, fine," he eventually concedes, and takes a bite out of the taco.

This time, his comical expression is one of barely suppressed revulsion. You've never claimed to be an especially good cook, but you didn't think you were _that _bad. How the hell do you fuck up a taco? Dirk gives you a pleading look and you give him one back that clearly telegraphs _eat the fucking rest of it or I will end you,_ and he begrudgingly takes another bite. And another, and another, until the entire thing is gone, and he looks just about ready to hurl.__

__He sets the plate down onto the table and resumes watching his shitty television. You sit with him for a time, carefully observing his behavior in your peripheral, before you push your plan to its next stage._ _

__"I'm horny, you want to fuck?" you suddenly say._ _

__"Uh..."_ _

__You stand up, looking down at him expectantly. "Well, come on."_ _

__Dirk evidently has no fucking idea what's going on with you and appears befuddled to no end, but that only keeps him back a moment or two. Eventually he slowly stands, a dubious look trained on you all the while. "... All right."_ _

__When he doesn't make a move to the bedroom himself, you grasp him by the wrist and haul him along behind you, making a quick path to the bedroom. You fling open the door, march in and shove Dirk down onto the bed. You're upon him again within moments, kissing him fiercely and tearing at his clothes; Dirk seems no less confused by your actions but reciprocates all the same, assisting you in his undress and pursuing yours as well. You kiss and pet each other and roll around and he tries to escalate the matter several times but you block each attempt, much to his rapidly growing frustration. You're only waiting for the right moment._ _

__And when it comes, the realization hits him in an instant._ _

__You have him pinned down beneath you, body pressed flush against his with your erections sliding painfully against each other in the tortuously scant stimulation you'll allow. His arm trails its way down your body to try to reposition your leg across his waist for better access to penetrate you, but you prudishly push it off aside and then grab his wrist to replace it above his head with the other. And he pulls at it, weakly at first, but then again in earnest when he suspects something's wrong, and when _you_ notice it you stop and you look at him and you relish the look of honest panic and powerlessness that flickers across his face in that instant._ _

__"Did you fucking _drug_ me?" he breathes, his voice somewhere between disbelieving amusement and anger. He tries to fight his way free even harder but he _can't,_ he's too weak and your grasp feels like iron and oh god it's a _rush,_ it truly is, your heart is being so hard in your chest you feel it might burst and you're shaking and nervous but _he still can't do anything about it._ For once he's the one who's helpless and at the mercy of your capricious whims and you'll be fucking damned if there isn't a sadistic joy in that, outright schadenfreude, just this _compulsion_ to use him and hurt him and abuse him and do everything to him that he does to you without even thinking. And you are all too eager to indulge._ _

__"You told me to take it, so that's what I'm doing."_ _

__You can scarcely control your grin as you roughly flip him over onto his stomach, quickly restraining his hands again. He thrashes the best he can, and it's much the weakened effort, but it doesn't pose _no_ challenge — you're still forced to contend with his wildly flailing limbs and a good earnest try, which is distracting if not particularly fruitful for him. _ _

__"I need to — I need to get the lube," you eventually pant, after some moments of trying to work out the logistics of both keeping him held down and acquiring it from the bedside drawer. You're overpowering him now but if you let him go long enough to get it he'll be fucking gone in a moment. "Fucking hold still, _Jesus_ —"_ _

__"Just fucking do it," he spits out, weakly straining against your grasp all the while. Your cock is painfully hard and already pushed up against his ass, and in a motion that _has_ to have been deliberate, he shifts and forces you to slide tortuously between his cheeks. _ _

__Your first impulse is to protest. You _want_ to fuck him — you want to scare him and make him feel helpless and worthless and used, even — but you don't want to _physically destroy his ass_. "But —"_ _

__" _Fucking do it!_ "_ _

__You don't feel very sure about this. You're not sure you even want to _do_ this anymore — definitely not this way. But you've gotten this fucking far and you worked so hard to get it, so how the fuck can you back down now? You hesitate longer than you should and your hands are shaking to the point where you're sure you won't be able to hold him much longer, even as weak as he is. You make the decision._ _

__You release one of his wrists just for a moment and he already begins to grapple to escape, so you're forced to be quick, but you feel like you have to at least do this much. You hock as much spit into your palm as you can muster and smear it along the length of your dick, and as much on his ass as you can manage but his lack of cooperation makes that difficult, and then you _do it_. He's not giving you the means to prep him or acclimate him, so you push inside and at the resistance you push harder and you don't know what the _fuck_ you're doing._ _

__Dirk locks up the moment you've gotten it inside, his muscles visibly tense. He's got his face pressed into the sheets but you can see his agonized grimace, see the sweat pouring off his body as he grips the sheets with all the might he has left; you can see all the effort it takes him to not _snap_ when you move inside him, shallow and with little pleasure._ _

__You can't fucking do this. At this point you're only half hard and just the motions of the act become more and more difficult with every thrust. Just looking at Dirk's face makes you feel like shit; however mad you are at him, you can't get off when he's fucking _suffering_ like that. You at least have some fucking measure of a conscience._ _

__With an aggravated groan, you pull out and flop down against the bed. There's a moment of still silence where Dirk lay unmoving where you left him — you're almost afraid he dropped dead — but eventually he shakily pushes himself up, his back turned to you, and asks a quiet question._ _

__"Why did you stop?"_ _

__You somberly look to him, though he refuses to look at you. "Because I didn't really want to hurt you."_ _

__"It was fine. I'm fine. I've had worse."_ _

__"Bullshit," you sigh, sitting up. You look at him but he won't look at you. "I wanted you to actually fucking enjoy it, not —"_ _

__He shifts to sit on the edge of the bed. You can tell the movement is painful for him. "I told you to do it. I'm not going to complain that you fucking did what I told you to."_ _

__Just as you'd expected. In the end, he truly is predictable. "Dude, that's because you're fucking _crazy_ — look, I know you're not going to complain, I don't give a shit, just —"_ _

__Dirk seems just about done with arguing, but his moody exit is interrupted when he immediately falters and curses upon pushing up off the bed to stand. You lurch up and scramble over him to catch him in his fall, and when he reflexively strains against you, you pull him down with you back onto the bed._ _

__You curse as he resists you, even despite the pain and his drug induced frailty. "Just stop — Just let me —"_ _

__"I don't want your fucking _pity,_ Christ," Dirk spits, his voice laced with a degree of venom that stops you in your tracks._ _

__When you stop, he stops — like he was fighting just to fight, with no plan on what to do once he'd won. You look at him lain beneath you and he looks at you, guarded and tense, and you're left at a loss as to what to do with this fucking wreck. "I just want to help you," you say. You feel miserable and shitty and resentful that he makes you feel so miserable and shitty but most of all you just fucking want _him,_ for him to trust you and value you beyond a cocksleeve and an emotional punching bag, to stop treating you like you're nothing, to not put you through all this fucking _sturm und drang_ over things you should be able to _talk_ about like normal fucking human beings — but you may as well wish for a pet unicorn for all the good it'll do._ _

__"I don't need your help."_ _

__"You don't have to need it to take it."_ _

__He stares at you unreadably for a time, but eventually pushes you off of him. You don't resist; you sit aside as he sits up himself and winces in a reflex he fails to suppress. You don't say anything. But this time, he looks down at himself, and then he looks to you, and he frowns. "I... think I'm bleeding."_ _

__"Shit," you say. Probably not the most apt choice of words. "Do you want me to, uh... look at it?"_ _

__"No," he quickly replies. "I know it's not that bad. I just —"_ _

__"Maybe you should just take a warm bath or something. Take some aspirin."_ _

__"... Yeah."_ _

__You don't offer to help him to it — you know he'd refuse anyway. Instead, you sit in bed and watch him as he slowly, agonizingly limps his way across the length of the room to the bathroom. He closes the door behind him and you're left alone._ _

__In the absence of anything else to do, you collect your clothes and redress. You wander to your bookshelf and look through for a book to read, but eventually come to terms with the fact you'd never be able to focus on it anyway. You settle back in bed and stare at the ceiling, mind peculiarly blank. Refreshingly so._ _

__Dirk emerges from the bathroom some time later. You look over to him stood frozen in the door frame, wet and wrapped in a towel, as he looks back at you with uncertainty etched across his face. "You want to lay with me?" you eventually offer, when he proves unable or unwilling to move or say anything himself._ _

__He seems hesitant to answer, but he eventually forgoes a verbal response entirely and simply makes the rest of his way over to your bed to collapse in a heap beside you. You reach out and pull him against you, and he surprisingly does not resist; he releases a heavy exhale as he rests his head against your chest and even wraps an arm around you to press your body closer to his. You're practically stunned, even, by the freeness of affection, and you're afraid to move or say anything lest you scare him off like some easily spooked animal._ _

__You tentatively bring up your arm to card your fingers through his damp hair, and some of your tenseness dissipates when that doesn't send him into a fit._ _

__"I know how bad it hurts," you mutter as you rhythmically run your fingers through his hair. He looks so different without it sticking up in all the meticulously styled angles that it does. It makes him look less ridiculous — like he's actually real, and not some carefully crafted caricature of irony with a fidelity to a persona that precludes any expression of humanity._ _

__"No you don't," he mumbles back, his voice muffled by the fabric of your shirt. "I didn't make you _bleed._ "_ _

__"You've made me bleed a shitload of times."_ _

__"That's not even the same — forget it." He exhales shakily. His breath is hot against your chest._ _

__"Do you want to go to a doctor? If it's that bad," you say._ _

__His reply is predictably hasty. "No."_ _

__"All right."_ _

__The both of you fall into silence after that, still apart from your breathing and the repetitive motions of your hand through his hair. Maybe it's just the drug making him drowsy, but he looks as peaceful as you've ever seen him. There's something disarming about it — Dirk has never been shy about being physical with you, but never in a way so unguarded and... chaste._ _

__A frisson of something warm spreads through your chest despite yourself and you're taken off-guard by the intensity of affection for him that hits you in that moment. You look at him and it _hurts,_ dwarfs everything else and makes all of the stress and misery he's caused you feel like the petty complaints of a petulant child. You can't remember why you were mad, or how you could have ever thought he wasn't worth it. It's bizarre and irrational and so terribly unwarranted on any reasonable account, but it makes your mouth go dry and stupid words catch in the back of your throat that even you aren't moronic enough to ever say. You settle for pressing your lips against the top of his head, breathing in his naked scent and holding him as closely as you dare. _ _

__

__***_ _

__

__It's not something either of you spend much time discussing, but you definitely feel like things have... changed, since the ass destruction incident. Dirk at least seems persuaded enough of your guilt to allow you to try to make up for it; you baby him pretty shamelessly and he surprisingly puts up with it with little complaint. It's a strange thing for him to not rebuff your affections, and you can't help but feel that it must be some sort of limited time deal, that you'll only be allowed to actually care about him for so long as he's injured. But as days turn into weeks into a month and he still hasn't healed, your desire to be permitted to actually engage in some degree of emotional intimacy with him begins to give way to concern._ _

__"It's been a month and you're _still_ in pain," you say, pulling on your shirt. You throw a glance over your shoulder back to Dirk seated on the bed; he's making a much slower work of his own redress. Doing much of anything seems to be an effort for him lately — even sex. When you have to wheedle _Dirk Strider_ for sex, you worry._ _

__"Wounds in that _area_ take a while to heal," he grunts dismissively. His casual lack of regard is somewhat damaged when he immediately grimaces following pulling up his pants._ _

__"When it was me the worst of it was gone within a couple of days. This can't be normal."_ _

__"You didn't have a _tear._ "_ _

__"I still want you to go to the doctor."_ _

__"Well, we don't always get what we want, do we?"_ _

__You turn around to sternly glare at Dirk. He meets your stare with one as unflinching as your own, eyebrows condescendingly raised. You're not going to let him win this one. "I made an appointment with a doctor for you tomorrow at noon anyway. Aradia will take you. Make sure you have your ID and your insurance inf—"_ _

__" _Hahahahahaha!_ I don't have fucking _insurance,_ " Dirk busts out in a derisive laugh. "You overprivileged little shit."_ _

__The color swiftly drains from your face. _God dammit,_ you've stepped in a pile of shit with that one. "Whatever, I forgot, it's —"_ _

__"And since I don't have insurance I don't have a fuckin' way to pay for this asshole to poke around in my asshole, so I'm gonna have to take a pass."_ _

__"I'll fucking pay for it," you groan. "Please, let's not do this aga—"_ _

__"I told you I don't want your money," Dirk retorts, thoroughly _doing it again anyway._ Yes, this tired old argument was exactly what you needed today. "I won't —"_ _

__You have absolutely had it. You brandish a finger at him, to which he musters his most haughty and dismissive expression, but you ignore him. "You _will_ take my money and you _will_ see this fucking asshole doctor and I don't care if I have to drug you again to get you there, I'm sick of this fucking garbage."_ _

__"Sheesh," he says, giving you a sour look as stands up and makes his way to stalk past you to the living room. "Who fucked _your_ ass without lube?"_ _

__You've never rolled your eyes harder in your life._ _

__

__***_ _

__

__"There's something you should probably know," Dirk says. He looks like he's trying to lean against the door frame of your office but he's far too stiff to manage it. He distinctly resembles a propped up corpse._ _

__You're a bit busy rifling through paperwork on your desk, so you return to your business with a mumbled, "What is it?" Your tone makes it clear enough that you'd rather not have the answer now._ _

__"When I saw the doctor he ordered some tests, and those... came back."_ _

__Well, so much for work. You swivel around in your chair to get a proper look at him, now earnestly concerned. "What tests? Are you okay?"_ _

__Dirk sighs laboriously, slowly raking his palm down his face. "My ass is fine, but you'll be thrilled to know I have chlamydia."_ _

__You were holding a pen. You drop it._ _

__"You're fucking with me, right?" you say, incredulous. You _really hope he is fucking with you.__ _

__"No," he sighs again, folding his arms over his chest. "And since I have it you probably have it so now you need to be tested."_ _

__"I can't believe this —"_ _

__Dirk groans. "Here comes the fuckin' _gloating_ —"_ _

__"You tried to get me to bareback while you had a fucking _disease,_ you dogshit fucker."_ _

__"I was clean when I _started_ fucking you."_ _

__"How the fuck do you know?"_ _

__Dirk narrows his eyes behind his shades. "I was alive and gay in the 80s, I get tested."_ _

__"And you never banged any other guys between me and your last test?"_ _

__"A couple, but I never did a thing without a rubber —"_ _

__"A couple is enough, and _we_ used condoms and still —"_ _

__"We've never used them when we do oral and I'm guessing dental dams aren't in your hookup repertoire, either. Hell, you sure weren't using one when you tore apart my ass. For all I know you could've given it to _me._ "_ _

__You pause for a moment. Could you have really...? You haven't had any symptoms of anything, though, so maybe you don't even have it at all. "... I doubt it," you eventually say, looking to Dirk with tentative skepticism._ _

__Dirk just throws his arms in the air. "Whatever. It doesn't matter. Just go get treated for it, I don't give a fuck." Before you can push the argument any further, he's escaped and closed the door to your office behind him._ _

__You hastily reach for your phone._ _

__

__***_ _

__

__Aradia drives you to the doctor's office the next morning for your appointment. You had to flash some cash to get in at such short notice, but you don't think you could've waited another day with your newfound hypochondria. By midnight following Dirk's announcement, you'd just about convinced yourself you have the Black Death._ _

__"What if I have herpes?" you hiss under your breath as you sit in the lobby of the doctor's office. Aradia is sat next to you, more for your nerves than anything, and you feel like you're not far from bursting in your rickety and uncomfortable chair._ _

__"Dave, you probably don't have herpes," Aradia says, much more loudly than you'd have liked. You frantically cast your gaze around the waiting room; thankfully, nobody seems to have heard or cared. You're not wearing your shades, which leaves you feeling exposed, but your desire to not be recognized going in for an STD test outweighs your ocular neurosis. Like it or not, dropping your shades and wardrobe really have proven to be more apt a disguise than anything else you could do._ _

__"You don't know that," you mutter._ _

__"..."_ _

__"What if I have AIDS?" you worry, digging your fingers into the wicker arm of the chair. God, this chair is _abominable,_ you'd complain if you weren't shitting your pants about —_ _

__"Dave, you don't have AIDS."_ _

__Oh god, you're going to die. "You don't know that."_ _

__"You have to get HIV to get AIDS."_ _

__"I could have that," you say. "You don't know I don't have that."_ _

__Aradia sighs deeply._ _

__

__***_ _

__

__You get the call back a worry-filled week after your appointment. By the time your phone rings, you're a heartbeat await from researching your own funeral arrangements._ _

__"Good evening, Mr. Lalonde. This is Dr. Amirmoez calling about —"_ _

__"Do I have AIDS?" you hastily blurt out, cutting him off._ _

__The doctor pauses for a moment before replying, "... Your HIV panel came back negative. As expected, you do have a chlamdyial infection but it looks like you're in good health otherwise. I'll be writing you a prescription for antibiotics, which should clear up the infection within one to two weeks. You'll have to refrain from sexual activity during that time to be certain you won't reinfect."_ _

__"Okay," you say dumbly, running your tongue over your dry lips. "That's all? It's nothing serious?"_ _

__"Chlamydia is easily treatable. I'd recommend you come back in in another three months for another round of tests to be sure, as it can take some time following infection for HIV to return a positive result. If that comes back clean, you can be reasonably certain that you're in the clear."_ _

__"Reasonably certain?" you ask, fidgeting nervously. It's like your brain _wants_ to keep shitting its pants. "I kinda want to be more than reasonably certain I'm not going to die of a horrible dick disease."_ _

__"It's a very good idea to be tested regularly when you're sexually active, especially if you have more than one or several successive sexual partners. You should be tested at least yearly, ideally every six months, and immediately if you begin displaying any symptoms you suspect may be indicative of an infection."_ _

__"That's a lot of testing."_ _

__"You can't put a price on good health, Mr. Lalonde."_ _

__Feeling significantly more assured than you were regardless of your residual overworrying, you thank and bid your doctor goodbye and hang up the phone. You return straight to where you'd left off with your internet time-killing; before it was anxiety keeping you from work, but general laziness was well eager enough to take its place._ _

__Your eye scans over your chumroll. You kind of want to tell Rose about your STD adventures, but you also don't want to give her the ammunition. You would literally fucking never hear the end of it. You notice Jade is also online — you figure it's unlikely she's at any risk, but you'd feel pretty guilty if there were some minuscule chance you were carrying around a disease for years and gave it to her and she never knew. You open up a pester window._ _

__turntechGodhead [TG] began pestering gardenGnostic [GG]_ _

__ TG: uh hey  
TG: i have another kind of weird question   
GG: ???   
TG: ok uh  
TG: well its more like a statement i guess   
GG: whats up?   
TG: ok well i got chlamydia but i dont know how long i might have had it so i figured id ask you if youve had any symptoms of anything  
TG: that was kind of a question actually   
GG: oh  
GG: actually....  
GG: i got treated for chlamydia a while ago   
TG: you did??   
GG: um  
GG: yes :o   
TG: wait why did you never tell me   
GG: i found out...... a while after we broke up so  
GG: i never considered i could have gotten it from you  
GG: i didnt want to worry you with it   
TG: youve been sleeping with other guys???   
GG: um.....  
GG: well were not together anymore dave  
GG: i didnt think i was required to be celibate >_>   
TG: no its just  
TG: you never tell me about any of that so i didnt think   
GG: i didnt tell you because i figured you wouldnt want to know about it :X   
TG: ok i just didnt take you for the casual sex type   
GG: whats that supposed to mean???   
TG: whoa wait i wasnt like calling you a slut or anything   
GG: i sure hope not dave!!   
TG: i wasnt i just didnt  
TG: ok im fucking up here   
GG: sigh  
GG: dave its fine  
GG: its ok to be a little jealous theres nothing wrong with that  
GG: and im not mad if you did give me chlamydia or whatever....  
GG: its a curable infection its not a big deal   
TG: i dunno how i could have gotten it though  
TG: i never cheated on you  
TG: and you never did either right   
GG: of course not!!!  
GG: jeez   
TG: i wasnt trying to accuse you of anything   
GG: you keep bringing it up!  
GG: why would you even think that   
TG: i dont  
TG: ugh forget it im just being stupid   
GG: well ok :|  
GG: anyway.... it could just be a coincidence and we both got it separately after we broke up  
GG: or you could have gotten it from meenah lol   
TG: but i havent had sex with meenah in like 13 years   
GG: well have you ever actually gotten tested before now?  
GG: i could never get you to go to the doctor   
TG: well  
TG: no   
GG: :/   
TG: but i always used condoms with everybody but you and you were a virgin and i never had any symptoms of anything ever so i assumed   
GG: :\   
TG: ok yes i feel really stupid you dont need to slantmouthface at me  
TG: jesus fucking christ could i really have been walking around with an std for 13 fuckin years   
GG: youd probably have noticed if youd really had it that long o_o  
GG: chlamydia can cause infertility and stuff if left untreated too long and im sure your doctor wouldve told you if anything like that happened  
GG: really you probably didnt have it when we were together  
GG: but i doubt well ever know  
GG: just be more careful from now on  
GG: youre lucky it was just chlamydia and not something worse   
TG: yeah  
TG: sorry to bring it up haha   
GG: its fine!!  
GG: im always happy to talk to you even if its about gross things :P   
TG: i wish we could talk more  
TG: about things not penis disease related   
GG: me too :(  
GG: it sucks were always so busy   
TG: mostly you  
TG: i spend half the year doing fuck all haha   
GG: hehe i guess so  
GG: im flying out for a special in indonesia next week so ill be off the radar again for a while   
TG: oh  
TG: thats cool i guess  
TG: whats the special about   
GG: the sumatran orangutan mostly!  
GG: there are only a few thousand of them left in the wild, its really sad  
GG: were hoping this will encourage indonesian authorities to be more proactive about wildlife conservation and cut back on its deforestation   
TG: good luck   
GG: thanks dave :)  
GG: alright i should go!! it was good to talk to you   
TG: you too  
TG: bye   
GG: byyeee :D _ _

__gardenGnostic [GG] ceased pestering turntechGodhead [TG]_ _

__

__***_ _

__

__"I'm busy," he says, wrist-deep in sopping wet puppet ass._ _

__You grimace as the sickening _squelch, squelch, squelch_ of Dirk vigorously fisting a puppet resounds through the air. You're stood in the doorway of his bedroom, beholding the spectacle of his work; he's got the large smuppet suspended from the ceiling in chains, each of its limbs locked up and tethered to either the makeshift ceiling rig or a brick haphazardly lain on the floor. With a handheld camera in one hand, he documents the harsh, jabbing motions of the other — he's fucking _destroying_ that thing, holy shit. Stuffing is literally coming out of its mouth._ _

__"I can see that," you say, moving into the room but allowing him a wide berth. "I wanted to ask you something."_ _

__"Can it wait?"_ _

__"I think it... probably should."_ _

__Dirk usually keeps his... career fairly discrete; he films everything in his room and never brings it up, so most of the time you completely forget you even have a pornographer under your roof. You can't deny you're a bit curious as to what exactly goes into it, so you hang back and watch him work._ _

__He goes at it for a long while. It's a little astounding how much patience he has for fisting puppets — you can't imagine that all of that footage is going to be going into a film, so you're a little mystified as to what exactly he needs all of that material for. By the time he pulls his fist out and turns the camera off, you're just about to die from boredom._ _

__"What did you want?" he grunts, grabbing a towel off his bed to wipe the lubricant off his arm. You can't help but be transfixed by the puppet's gaping ersatz anus beside him._ _

__"Uhh..." You manage to snap your attention back to Dirk. "I was just thinking that it's been a while since the thing and — you're better now, right?"_ _

__Dirk gives you a long, hard and suspicious look before he answers, "... Yeah. Why?"_ _

__"So I thought maybe we could try it again. Without me having to rape you or give you horrible anal tears?"_ _

__He just laughs and moves about to unchain the suspended puppet. "You're kidding, right?"_ _

__"Well... no."_ _

__"You're seriously bringing this up again after all that shit you did to me," he says, pausing to throw you a stern look._ _

__"... Yeah."_ _

__You feel kind of like a dick now, but you'd also kind of hoped that things would be different. Just as you'd expected, Dirk had started to pull back from the intimacy he'd allowed when he was injured as soon as he was well again, and you were worried if you didn't ask now you'd lose your chance entirely once things had returned to normal — but now you realize it was probably stupid to ask at all._ _

__But when Dirk finishes pulling the puppet down and stops to reply to you again, there's a trace of something oddly resembling defeat to his voice. "Is fucking me in the ass really _that_ important to you?"_ _

__Put that way, the whole thing seems tremendously silly. You shove your hands self-consciously into your pants pockets and give a non-committal shrug of your shoulder. "I guess I'd like to do it. It's not really a—"_ _

__" _Fine,_ " he sighs, carelessly casting the puppet aside. Your heart nearly skips a beat. "If that fucking fiasco didn't discourage you nothing fucking will, so I'll do it if it'll get you to shut the fuck up about it."_ _

__You perk up immediately. "Really? You won't even make me have to fucking beat you up for it?"_ _

__"Don't push your luck," he deadpans, brusquely pushing past you to stride through the living room and to your bedroom._ _

__You linger for a dumbfounded moment before hurrying along in his wake. You do your best to keep your cool, but once you've got him stood before your bed and going through the motions of undressing himself your excitement becomes a little pathetic. You fumble with the buckle of your belt and your shirt catches on your arms and you near trip and fall to the ground trying to fight your way out of your pants._ _

__He's chosen to sprawl out on his stomach before you, his arms folded beneath his head with a pillow to cushion it. He looks back at you expectantly, and you managed to avoid shitting yourself when you nervously climb up onto the bed above him._ _

__You can't imagine his prone position leaves him especially comfortable, exposed and vulnerable as he is. That only creates an additional pressure to perform — you want to make it good for him, you really do, but you get the feeling that his standards of satisfaction have been set so high there'll be no way that you will reach them._ _

__You lean over him to grab your lube out from the bedside table, but you pause. Maybe you should... _shit_._ _

__Shit is exactly what you're thinking about as you stare down at his ass beneath you. You should probably, uh, lick his ass, shouldn't you? He's probably gonna have a tenseness problem and you know that works wonders for you — but the prospect of actually _doing_ it _to_ another person is... less than appetizing. Kind of disgusting, even. Logically you know he's not so fucking nasty that he literally does not wipe his ass but you can't seem to shake that instinctual revulsion that comes with the idea of putting your tongue in a place that poop comes out._ _

__Tentatively, you reach out to lay a hand on his ass. He does have a spectacularly nice ass, which is certainly a plus. You run your thumb over his skin and gently spread his cheeks, battling a steadily building sense of dread as you perform a basic sight check. You're almost _hoping_ it's nasty so you'll have an actual excuse not to do it — but to your conflicted dismay, he appears to be entirely clean. You bite your lip in apprehension and spread him further, almost clinically analyzing his asshole. Eventually you've got him as far pried apart as you can manage without actually sticking your fingers in, and it all checks out. _Oh god, you actually have to do it.__ _

__"Are you fucking me or giving me a colonoscopy?" Dirk eventually grouses, snapping you out of your stupor._ _

__You jump and pull your prying fingers back. "I, uh —"_ _

__"If you don't want to do this that's fuckin' fine by me."_ _

__"No!" you hurriedly interject, reflexively shooting your hands back forward to grab his ass again. You're not sure exactly what that was supposed to accomplish. "I still want to, I just need to... psyche myself up to... uh."_ _

__"Well, hurry the fuck up with it," Dirk concedes, returning his face back to the smothering safety of his pillow._ _

__You take a deep breath._ _

__...and hold it in. It's probably best if you can't _smell_ what you're doing. You close your eyes and very tentatively, very slowly lean in, until you're inches from his ass and you have nowhere to run. You spread him with your hands again and grimace, but you have to do it. You have to lick his ass._ _

__You stick out your tongue. Your eyes are closed so you can't see what you're doing and your tongue doesn't reach so you open them and then it's staring you in the face, like some sort of unflinching brown eye, and in your surprise you jolt in such a way that your tongue brushes against his skin and oh god _you did it and there's no turning back.__ _

__Nose held, eyes squeezed shut, you suck it up and go for it. You drag your tongue gingerly over his hole, mostly just the tip — he's so warm and just that little contact sets him to move beneath you, which is a rather encouraging response. On your next attempt you return with considerably more courage, less fear that just touching him will cause you to burst into flame. You put more of the breadth into it, feeling out the texture of the skin. It's... really not that bad._ _

__You don't even notice the taste; all you feel is his warm skin against your tongue and the tremors of his body under your touch and the way his breath hitches and runs ragged as you lick inside of him, how he pushes up into you even despite himself — your hands are shaking and you're rock hard in your pants and you haven't even touched yourself. You spread him wider with your thumbs and lick more eagerly, force your tongue in deeper, long strokes along the moist inner flesh and over the erratically spasming ring of muscle around it. He clenches down around you and a breathy moan escapes your throat._ _

__"You're really gettin' into that, aren't you," Dirk hums. Your heart is beating so fast you almost don't hear him over the sound of your pulse in your ears._ _

__You're far beyond the point of making a coherent verbal reply. Your ministrations wander, your tongue stroking over his taint or his balls to draw them into your mouth to suck, replacing your attentions to his ass with your thumb to rub around the muscle — but you're always drawn back with your tongue, to push past and feel how relaxed and eager he is, how much so you've _made_ him. You almost want to just finish like this, with your hand down your pants and your tongue up his ass, but you don't want to squander the opportunity to fuck him while he's actually _cooperating._ You don't know when that'll come by again._ _

__With a shaky breath you pull back and then reach across Dirk's body to the bedside table. You blindly sift around inside the drawer until you locate your lube and return, hastily squeezing out an excessive amount onto your fingers. The lack of contact spurs Dirk to twist around to look at you, but as soon as he does your touch returns to reassure him._ _

__Your first finger slides inside easily with all of the lubrication. He's hot and tight around you — very tight — and the thought of that sensation around your dick, of burying yourself deep inside of him, sends a jolt to your groin that makes you twitch and your mouth run dry. You lick your lips self-consciously as you probe inside of him with your finger, spreading the lube around, before you draw back to squeeze another inside._ _

__Dirk immediately tenses around you and you stall. "Relax," you tell him, and he grunts in irritation._ _

__"Easier said than done."_ _

__"Just — just relax," you repeat, slowly sinking your fingers deeper. You knew you'd have to be patient with him, especially given what you fucking _did_ to him, but you're far from a patient man and you're just about to burst in your pants. You grit your teeth as you scissor out your fingers, stroke against his prostate in hope the pleasure will encourage him to relax — but like it or not, getting your dick in isn't going to be quick._ _

__You get him as slick and stretched as you can manage before you slip in a third, and like clockwork he tenses up again. You reassure him once more, stay shallow and slow until he acclimates to the new size before you push further in and stretch further out. You've gotten his ass drenched in lube and even tight as he is your fingers slide in and out like a knife through butter, but you're not sure it's quite enough, if you shouldn't give it a little more —_ _

__"Put it in already," Dirk grits out, and you look up in surprise._ _

__"Are you su—"_ _

__" _Yes._ "_ _

__You nearly give yourself whiplash pulling your fingers out. You scramble to position yourself above him, wiping off the excess lube covering your hand onto your dick, and on an impulse you flip him over onto his back._ _

__"Wh—"_ _

__You cut him off with your lips and settle between his legs even as his hands tightly grip your arms, and you thrust against him and miss and slide wetly against his body and you're shaking too badly to even do this but you wrench your arm free, grab your dick and push in._ _

__Dirk freezes beneath you, stiff as a log, as you sink inside. It only takes a couple short thrusts to spread the lube deep enough to make it in all the way, and before you know what's happened you're fucking balls deep with your brother staring up at you with saucerplate eyes._ _

__"You're too tense," you say after a moment of awkward stillness; it comes out as a whisper._ _

__" _I know,_ " Dirk grits out._ _

__You stall, painfully still, your cock throbbing inside of him as you wait for him to acclimate. Your arms tremble in the effort to support your weight despite your nerves and impatience; you can feel it so intensely, even just his pulse around you sending jolts through your body._ _

__You can't move your hips, but you do draw the rest of your body closer to him. "Bro," you breathe out by his ear, voice heavy and hot. The word earns you a sharp little inhalation of breath; he really, _really_ likes it when you call him that in bed, and it doesn't seem to be any less effective in this situation. You pull the lobe of his ear between your teeth, lick around the shell and say, "God, Bro, I wanna fuck you so bad — god you're fucking tight —"_ _

__One of Dirk's arms finds its way around your back to dig his blunt fingernails into your skin. "Yeah?" he asks, an uncharacteristic quaver to his voice._ _

__"Yeah," you echo. You kiss his cheek by his ear and his jaw and then his lips, teasing him with a nip of your teeth. He follows you when you pull back, and you return to push your tongue into his hungry mouth; he reciprocates with fervor, licking against your tongue, sucking your lips wet and sloppily into his mouth with a level of desperation usually only you get into. The wrap of his legs tightens around your waist, pulling you even closer to him and even deeper inside; you gasp and grimace against his lips at the shift, the tantalizing stimulation verging on tortuous._ _

__His voice is almost hoarse when he speaks again. "You — you can —"_ _

__You don't even let him get the sentence out before you start to move. You draw back, slowly and shakily; you feel his fingers against your back tense and when you sink back in again, inch by inch, he seems intent on matching the depth with his nails against your skin. You move your mouth to his neck, panting raggedly against his skin, bite down on the juncture of his shoulder when you meet the hilt. All you want is to fucking pound him, turn him inside fucking out but more than your lust is your fear and anxiety to please and all you want is for him to _like_ it. So you take it slow, more slowly than you can even handle, as you stroke in and out, shuddering against him in the effort._ _

__"I'm not going to fucking break," Dirk growls, pulling you in sharply deeper with his legs to prove a point._ _

__You falter and nearly collapse atop him, but you catch yourself, and you pause to look him uncertainly in the eye. "You did last time," you say._ _

__"Shut the fuck up."_ _

__Well — you're not one to take a yes for a no, so you shut your eyes and needily press your lips to his and you move a little faster, thrust in a little more forcefully. Dirk cants up his hips to meet you and you find a bit of courage, angling up a hard stroke. He releases a choked noise and you look at his face and your chest burns and all you want is to _consume_ him, to own him and break him and to never let go, so you do, so you snap into him in a mounting pace that leaves you all but delirious from the pleasure. You devolve into an incoherent mess, blathering about everything and nothing into his skin._ _

__You're not at it for long before you're approaching your climax, but you can tell he's still a ways off. You try to hold back but he won't let you relent with the blistering pace you've set, and you don't really want to either, so as you fuck him and pound him you breathlessly choke out, "I'm going to — I can't —"_ _

__"Don't stop," he demands, refusing to let you pull away._ _

__You release a shuddering breath and an erratic snap of your hips and you ride it to the edge, rolling into him with the full motion of your body until you're gone and you can't stop and you're spilling yourself inside of him. The release pulses through you in waves that leave you disarmed and all but dead to the world until they've passed, and you find yourself stiff and stilled and panting above him with his legs wrapped around you and your quickly deflating cock still inside him. A quick visual assessment confirms that he is indeed far from done, so you pull yourself out and descend between his thighs to finish the job._ _

__You quickly take him into your mouth, plunging your shaking fingers into his ass to fill the void. Your own jizz leaks out from around your own fingers as you fuck him, matching the pace with hasty motions of your head and tongue. You suck him hard, jab up into that spot inside him even harder, and he thrusts up into you and slides past your limit and you choke but you don't stop. He comes and fills your throat and your mouth, and you swallow and hungrily chase after every trace that dribbles free with your tongue._ _

__You pump him with your fist until he's thoroughly drained, and then you sigh, the rush fading into drowsy exhaustion. You give a look to your sticky hands and carelessly wipe them off on the sheets, then look to Dirk with what you hope isn't too much contrite._ _

__"I'm sorry I couldn't — it was too much and —"_ _

__"It's fine," he cuts you off. "It felt good."_ _

__"Really?"_ _

__"Yeah."_ _

__Something bizarrely reminiscent of pride wells in your stomach, a lopsided grin threatening to spread across your face. You manage to contain yourself, though, and settle for a carefully measured, "Does that mean you'll be willing to do it again?"_ _

__Dirk hesitates but doesn't look at you; he pauses for a moment before he responds. "Yeah. I guess. If you want to."_ _

__"Okay. I'd like that."_ _

__Not sure where to go from there, you share an awkward still moment before you settle in next to him in bed. He rolls to his side and consents to letting you wrap your arms around him and press against his back. He doesn't move, or say anything, but the feeling of his warmth and his body against you makes you feel a little high and if you held him as closely as you wanted to you'd be afraid he might burst._ _

__"I really... like this. This is good," you say quietly, lips against his neck._ _

__You're almost sure he didn't hear, he takes so long to reply — but he eventually does, his voice as low as yours. "It's not like I'm opposed to spooning. _This_ doesn't have to be a big deal."_ _

__"Not that. Just... the... not fighting."_ _

__"Mm."_ _

__"It wouldn't kill you to be... nice to me, sometimes. Care about what I want once in a while."_ _

__Dirk falls into silence. You're not sure why you bother, but you push the subject anyway._ _

__"You treat me like I'm your idiot kid brother," you say, and the words feel even stupider out of your mouth than they did in your head._ _

__Dirk quietly laughs. "You _are_ my idiot kid brother."_ _

__"I know." You exhale. "But we also fuck. And live together."_ _

__"So?"_ _

__"So it kinda feels shittier when your lover acts like he thinks you're a stupid moron child he can't stand than it does when he's _just_ your brother."_ _

__The silence returns again, this time for what feels like eternity. You'd given up and assumed the conversation was done by the time he speaks up again. "Sometimes I'm nice to you."_ _

__"You're usually not," you say. You close your eyes and nuzzle against his skin, taking in his scent and warmth._ _

__"I'm sorry."_ _

__"No you're not."_ _

__The stillness is broken only by the even breaths you both take._ _

__"I'll try to be."_ _


	15. Chapter 15

You wake up to a morning like any other.

Or, perhaps not like any other, given that you're actually conscious during its hour — you're two days back from a morning show appearance and your sleep schedule still hasn't rolled back to its post-noon state of lethargic normalcy. You roll over with a lazy yawn, stretching out in the empty bed. It's not that strange that you have it to yourself; you went to bed with Dirk last night, but he's gone by the time you wake often as not, either gone to return to his own room after you've fallen asleep or awoken long before you begin the long and laborious process of pulling yourself from bed. Dirk goes to bed late and wakes freakishly early and promptly, a feat that befuddles you to no end.

You throw back the covers, pull yourself onto your feet, and blearily stagger to the bathroom. You complete the same morning routine you always do, dress yourself in something appropriate for fucking off in your apartment all day, and make your way into the main area of the apartment marginally more conscious than you were when you first cracked open your eyes. The building is still and silent apart from the quiet hum of your air conditioning. The door to Dirk's room is closed, but you don't bother to disturb him.

You grab a bag of Doritos and two of your small little baby child apple juice boxes and head for your office. You figure you'll have your nutritious breakfast and start work at the same time.

As soon as you've sat down, though, you realize you've forgotten your phone by its charger in your bedroom, so you get up and wander back to collect it. On your return trip, you turn on the screen to check it — and you are surprised to be greeted by five missed calls from John. That's... strange.

Not sure whether you should be curious or worried, you sit back down in your office chair and quickly give him a return dial. It rings far many more times than you'd like before John actually picks it up.

"Dave," John breathes out before you have a chance to so much as greet him.

"Yo," you say, swiveling in your chair absently. "Why do I have five missed calls from your needy ass?"

There's an uncomfortable pause. "Um. I'm just calling you to tell you you... probably should not look at the internet today."

What the hell? Now you're starting to get weirded out. "What? Why?" you ask, growing increasingly anxious. "Did something happen?"

"Sort of." There's another pause and you're swiftly being overcome with an urge to strangle him. "Well, something did happen and we agreed I should probably call you and tell you about it before you — um. I'm just trying to figure out how to word this in a way that won't freak you out? I think Rose should have called you instead, she is way better at — uh — words —"

"John, you are freaking me out."

"Well. Um." _John you **fucking fucker.**_ "So there's sort of this? Video of you? That's on the internet now. And it's sort of compromising."

Your immediate thought is that somebody had taken a video of you at that party you crashed a few days ago — but Youtube videos of you being a loud and shitfaced idiot aren't exactly news to anybody, and certainly never anything John has sent you five missed phone calls over. An acute sense of dread rapidly builds in your stomach as you try to remember what you could have possibly done that was tha—

_**Oh.** _

"Oh," you say, all of the blood draining out of your face.

"... Yyyeaah..." John replies, paragon of eloquence that he is.

You actually feel sort of numb. The panic probably won't hit you for a little while.

You sit in silence for a moment, phone held to your ear, but John eventually interrupts. "I'm... sorry, man."

"Y-yeah. Thanks," you mumble. "For telling me. I guess. I'm gonna go."

"I'm sure nothing will —"

"Bye," you mutter as you hang up. Your fingers are shaking and it's hard to press the button on the screen. Once you do, you set your phone down on your desk before you and just look at it. It sits there, inanimate.

You turn on your computer.

The expanse of your icon dotted desktop screen stares back at you tauntingly. You don't know if you _want_ to open your browser. You don't know if you can. Maybe actually seeing it and the gossip and the vitriol will make you snap. You don't even want to think about what this will mean for your career. You impotently clench and unclench your fists in your lap for a long time before you lift your trembling hand to your mouse and click over to pesterchum, carefully ensure you'll sign in as invisible, and load up the program.

It's still very early in the morning, so there's not much of anybody on — apart from the only person that matters. 

The moment you've opened the pester window, the dam bursts.

turntechGodhead [TG] began pestering tentacleTherapist [TT]

TG: oh jesus  
TG: has mom seen it yet  
TG: jesus jesus jesus fuck me jesus   
TT: I don't think she's woken up before noon in ten years, so I think there's some time yet.   
TG: she cant thats just  
TG: i have to stop this from happening   
TT: Dave.  
TT: This is our mother.  
TT: She's going to watch it.   
TG: no   
TT: Yes.   
TG: no no no oh my fucking god  
TG: no she cant  
TG: i  
TG: FUCK   
TT: There's no point in pitching a fit about an inevitability.   
TG: rose  
TG: my mother  
TG: my fucking MOTHER  
TG: is about to watch  
TG: a dude  
TG: jizz on my face  
TG: do you not comprehend the weight of what is about to transpire  
TG: the miasma of shame that i am about to be engulfed by will be deeper and more inescapable than the gravity well of the planet fucking jupiter   
TT: Yes, I know.  
TT: But there's nothing you can do about it now.   
TG: rose  
TG: rose im going to literally die   
TT: Dave, you're not going to literally die.   
TG: fuck shit ass dick FUCK  
TG: oh god  
TG: ok  
TG: ok im going to call her  
TG: maybe itll be better if she hears about it from me first   
TT: She's still going to watch it.   
TG: omfg

turntechGodhead [TG] ceased pestering tentacleTherapist [TT]

Your hands are shaking so badly when you pick up your phone that dialing your mother's phone number is utterly impossible. You fight through your contact list instead and phone her from there, but even hitting the button is a Herculean feat in your state. You push away from your desk in your rolling chair and skid across the floor with your phone to your ear, waiting for her to pick up. You spin and push about your chair on its wheels like a spaz but it's not really any sort of comfort.

"H-hey mom," you breathe as you hear your mother pick up the other line, bringing your chair-rolling distraction to a halt. Your heart is beating so fast in your chest you feel you might faint. It takes every once of your willpower to not just throw the phone across the room, crawl under your desk and never come out.

"Hey sweetie!" she answers, evidently enthused to hear from you. She sounds sleepy; you probably just woke her up.

You push up from your chair and begin to pace nervously. You exit your office entirely; you're going to need the entire apartment space for this. "Hey. Um. Mom, there's something I need to tell you."

Shit shit shit shit shit. You sound like you're about to tell her you have cancer and now she's going to worry and _holy fucking shit way to go fuckhead Jesus fucking Christ._ Just as you expected, her voice immediately takes on a tone of concern. "Honey, what's the matter? Is everything all right?"

"I'm fine, mom," you reply hastily. You immediately double back for your office; the living space is too open and reminds you too much of the fact the world is _huge and exists._ "Nothing happened. To me, I mean — I'm fine, I mean I'm not hurt or anything — _fuck._ "

"What's going on?" She sounds even more worried than before. Fuck fuck fuck fuck you can't do anything right.

You sit back down in your chair, then stand up again. "Look, I need to you to _promise me_ you won't freak out about what I'm about to tell you. _Please._ "

"Just tell me what happened, it's okay."

You take a deep breath. _Fuck. Fuuuuucccckkkkk._ "Okay, well, it's just that — _please don't freak out oh god_ —"

Your mother sighs in exasperation. "Davey, I'm not going to freak out. Just _tell_ me."

"Um. I kinda. Well."

"Sweetheart, if you don't spit it out this instant I'm going to come over there and smack you. Don't think I won't."

You believe her.

"Mom I made a sex tape and it leaked and it's all over the internet and my life is fucking _over,_ " you blurt out as quickly as you physically can. You're afraid you might have a heart attack.

A long moment of silence ensues, your breath nervously held.

Then she starts _laughing._

" _Oh my god why are you laugh_ —"

" _Honey,_ " your mother interrupts. "I'm not upset with you! It's _okay._ You're gonna be okay. Just calm down."

You're practically hyperventilating at this point, and try as you might, you can't seem to make the situation any less _utterly fucking mortifying_. You collapse back into your chair when your legs threaten to give way. "No, you don't understand — it's — I just — oh god."

Whatever manner of horror you managed to stave away returns the moment your mother speaks again, with all the cadence of a gossipy teenage girl. "Who was it with? Was it Jade?"

You nearly choke on your own spit. "No!"

"Well, then who is she?" she giggles. _Oh fucking god._

"That's... that's the part. The part that's bad," you inarticulately respond, now finding your mouth unpleasantly dry. You anxiously jiggle your leg.

"Huh?"

"It's a guy. Like... in the tape. I'm with a guy."

"What?"

You grow frustrated. Saying it once was hard enough. "Mom, I have a _gay sex tape._ A tape in which I'm engaged in _homosexual gay sex with a man._ "

"... Really? Huh." She doesn't sound disgusted with you, at least. Logically, you knew there's no way she would've been, but fears are even queerer than you are. "You never told me you were gay."

Everything about this feels so fucking _surreal._ You've played out this conversation in your head so many times over the past 15 years, but none of them turned out to even vaguely resembled the reality. You never could have imagined it would happen like this. You feel stiff and awkward and so fucking _silly_ when you answer, "I'm not gay. I'm bisexual."

"Ohhh. Okay, that makes more sense," she says. The world is intensely not ending, in a way that is very alarming to you. "That still doesn't explain why you never told me!"

"Look, it doesn't matter, just pr—"

"Did you think I was going to hate you for it? Oh, Davey, you know I love you, I'd never —"

"Mom, I know, just —"

"— No matter who you are or what you do or who you love you'll _always_ be my little boy, I love you _s_ —"

"Mom, I _know._ "

"— _o much_ and that will _never ever change_ and don't you ever think —"

"Mom!" you shout into the receiver. " _Oh my god, shut up, please,_ listen for _five seconds._ "

You hear her drawing herself up over the phone. Shit. "Don't talk to me that way, young man," she scolds you; you instantly feel like you're five years old again.

You slump in your chair. "I'm sorry, just," you shakily exhale. "Please, promise me. _Promise me_ you won't watch the video."

Your mother hesitates before she replies. "Sure, honey," she says, before rapidly changing the topic. "How did it get out?"

It honestly hadn't even crossed your mind for a moment, at this point. The implications unsettle you in ways you aren't ready to deal with. "I don't know yet," you breathe. You really don't want to think about it right now.

"Who is this man you're with? Was it Ben? He always seemed a bit gay to me."

You screw up your face. "No, it wasn't Ben. Ben is married, mom."

" _So am I,_ " your mother saucily replies.

" _Oh my fucking god, what is that supposed to mean?_ "

"Don't worry your pretty little head about it, sweetie," she giggles. You long for a rock with which to smash in your own skull. "I take it he's not anyone I know."

"No."

"Are you dating him?"

You have to think about it; you swivel around in your chair a few times before you answer. "Maybe. I guess. Yeah," you say, switching your nervous jiggling to your other leg. "I've been with him since around March. He lives with me now. So we are, I guess. Dating." The word seems terribly strange to apply to him, and you're sure he'd laugh his ass off if he heard you say it, but you're not about to describe him to your mother as your living buttplug.

"Baby, I'm so happy for you."

You just feel uncomfortably awkward now. "Um. Thanks?"

"I expect you'll be bringing him home for Christmas!"

_Oh god. Oh god no._

"Mom," you grit out. "No."

"Why not?"

 _Where to fucking begin._ You start with the easiest answer. "I still have to find out about... this leak. If he did it."

"Oh. I see."

"Yeah," you somberly reply. You _really_ don't want to think about that. You know if you think about it it'll only lead to further lack of surprise and a generous dosage of self-castigation. You're afraid that all you're going to find is that you have no one to blame but yourself. But you're going to have to think about it, and you're going to have to confront him about it, and it's better you do it sooner than later. You release a heavy sigh and say, "Listen, I'm gonna go. I'll talk to you later, okay?"

"All right," you mother answers. She takes on an uncharacteristically serious tone. "Dave, please don't be too hard on yourself about this. I promise you it's going to be okay. It'll all blow over before you know it. It's 2011, sweetheart, this won't even mean anything to anyone."

"If you say so," you reply, heavily skeptical.

"I do, 'cause I'm right! Take care, honey."

"Thanks. Bye."

You hang up the phone again and your shoulders slump.

Like it or not, you're going to have to deal with Dirk. You shove the cell into your pants pocket and pull yourself to your feet, then make your way out into the living area. You're not surprised at all when you push open the door to Dirk's room and find it deserted, but you're not sure what that says — it's certainly a suspicious sign that he's chosen to up and disappear the day a sex tape he filmed leaked onto the internet, but with him you don't know what kind of ass backwards justification he might have cooked up for getting out of dodge. But, of course, as is always the core point of insanity with him and everything that involves him, it's not any kind of shock that this happened, and you can entirely envision a scenario where he'd deliberately let it loose. The fact you're still together never ceases to astound your critical mind — fuck, that you're standing in his empty room after all of this and thinking of your relationship in terms of _still together!_

You're angry when you leave his room and you're furious when you gather your things and get in your car and you hit a red light that lingers a little too long than you can handle and it's all you can do to stop yourself from fucking crying at the intersection. But you're not going to be a fucking _pussy_ or let this get to you, or let _him_ get to you, so you suck it the fuck up and you don't cry and you pretend you don't really care and by the time you arrive at Dirk's old apartment complex you've almost convinced yourself it's the truth.

You pull up into the parking lot. The streets are empty of cars and the lot itself similarly so; only a dozen or so run down vehicles dot the spaces, including Dirk's own beaten up car. You don't know whether the fact you've found him is a relief or if it compounds your dread.

You warily park your car in the most inconspicuous spot you can find and step out onto the lot. It's oddly cold, and you find yourself wishing you'd brought a coat. You double check to be sure your car is locked before you hurriedly make your way to the door of the complex.

The building itself is fairly modest in size, but it's clearly in disrepair. You open the door and let yourself into the entryway; a fluorescent light flickers to life above you upon your entrance, and then deigns to continue flickering for the duration of your stay. It's a discomforting presence that only makes you all the more eager to be over and done with this.

Entering the main body of the building requires a key card, which you lack, so you buzz the number of every apartment in the building _but_ Dirk's in hopes they'll assume you're the postman and let you up without asking; luckily for you you hit a tenant who does just that, and you quickly steal into the complex when the door opens up to you.

You quickly ascend the stairs. The stairwell is littered in trash and smells heavily of tobacco, which makes you viscerally cringe; you breathe through your mouth to be rid of the worst of the smell and continue on your way to the top floor as quickly as you can manage. You step out onto the top and push open the door to the hallway, it too illuminated by a series of dead and half-dead fluorescent lights that make you feel quite like the subject of a horror movie.

You find the door to Dirk's apartment towards the end of the hall and similarly find yourself frozen in front of it. You've come all this way and you haven't once thought about what you'll do or say to him when you got here, not really, and no matter how long you think on it now nothing of worth seems to come up. You know what you should say, and you know what you want to say, but you know you don't want to say the former and you know you shouldn't say the latter. Your mind draws a long, long blank.

Eventually you accept defeat and throw yourself to the mercy of improvisation. With a deep breath, you hastily rap on the door; you're not surprised when you don't get an answer. The door to the apartment next to Dirk's opens and you skittishly jump, but it's only his neighbor stepping outside. The both of you stare at each other for a short but uncomfortable time — with thin and rattily disheveled hair and a face dotted in scabs and open sores, you aren't exactly put at ease by the young woman's appearance. You don't imagine yours is of any more comfort to her.

She turns her gaze to the floor and flees quickly, but the sight of her leaves you unnerved. He lived here for months in this wretched filth and squalor, surrounded by a piteously destitute lot of what you can only assume to be drug addicts and criminals, in one of the shittiest parts of the city — you're nervous to even be standing in the hall of this building. When you knock on the door again, it's with a renewed sense of urgency.

"Dirk, open the door," you say, as loudly as you dare. You're wary of drawing the attention of anyone else in the building.

Silence.

"Look, I know you're in there, your car is parked outside." Silence. "I'm not even mad, I just want to talk." Silence. "Will you ju—"

At once the door wrenches open to reveal Dirk on the other side, as stern as you've ever seen him. You share a tense look before he hurries you inside. You don't know why you feel any safer with him than you do standing exposed in the hallway.

Dirk's apartment is even more appalling than the last time you'd seen it. It's a single room apartment, and a small one at that; a tiny mockery of a kitchen is squeezed into the corner to the left of the door, and it's scarcely a few paces' length to the opposite end where the small air mattress and nest of ratty blankets Dirk calls a "bed" resides. He has no couch, no television, no dining table; his most extravagant belongings are a small folding desk and chair where he keeps a computer setup that can't be any younger than ten years old. Towards the far end of the room are two doors, which you presume are for his matchingly minuscule bathroom and closet, but you didn't even want to see the insides of those.

You'd already been well acquainted with the moldy water damaged walls and ruined and stained carpets, but the room's single light fixture seemed to have joined the party of disrepair. The only light that illuminates the apartment is the dim light that filters through the small, single window on the wall. You hope you can get this over with quickly.

"... Want something to drink?" Dirk eventually offers, his words as stilted as the gesture was pointless. You shake your head no.

"I'm assuming you're here and not home because of the leak," you say. Your voice is surprisingly level. 

"Yeah," he says. He shoves his hands into his pockets and offers no further explanation.

When it comes down to it, all you really want to know is _why._

"Why did you do it?" 

"I didn't."

"Then why are you here?"

You can't see behind his shades but you know he won't meet your eye. "'Cuz I knew you'd think I'd done it either way. So I just left to make it easier for both of us."

You aren't any more sure of what to say now than you were when you were stood outside his door.

"I deleted it from my phone the day after we made it."

"I emailed it to myself before that. I guess someone could've gotten it off your mail server, or something." He shrugs.

"Why didn't you tell me that? Why are you here?"

He shrugs again.

The fact you have no idea what to think should be condemnation enough.

He could be completely innocent, but you don't trust him. You don't have an ounce of doubt that he would be capable of doing this to you. You could believe him utterly, you could have incontrovertible proof it was not by his hand, but it _could have been._ If not this, something else just as bad. This is crazy. You're crazy. He is a walking mistake and you're a helpless fool playing into his trap. 

Your immediate impulse is even to believe him. You rationally know he could do it, but you want to believe he hasn't. You wish you could trust him and that stupid part of you is trying so hard to _make_ yourself trust him. Part of you suspects his suspicious behavior is a deliberate affectation put on to try to make him look more emotional and authentic in his human irrationality, and the other just wants to buy into it. Part of you is terrified to be around him and the other just wishes to be ignorant to all of it.

"Do you want me to leave town?"

You know what you should say. You know what you want to say. It seems the twain were never destined to meet.

"I think I just need some — just a bit of time," you say, forcing yourself into a "compromise" far more difficult than it should be. "Don't leave. I should just be alone for — for —" You struggle with the words. "I should just be alone."

"Then I'll be here. Until... whenever." He's so calm. You hate how he can be so calm about everything. 

"All right," you swallow, and try to wet your dry lips with your equally dry tongue. "All right. I'll — I'm going to go home. I'll talk to you later. If I do." You toss in an awkward shrug.

Dirk doesn't reply; he simply stands where he is like an unmoving statue. You linger for a fleeting moment before turning and stepping out of his shitty little apartment, and quietly shut the door behind you.

 

***

 

When you get home, you're not sure what to do. Meenah and Eridan and Terezi all call you, along with a slew of people ranging from business associates to barely familiar acquaintances, but you ignore them, and shut off your phone when they continue to call. Aradia comes over to check on you, but you send her away. You'd normally just be killing time on the internet, but you're terrified to even look at it and see the fallout. But you sit back down at your desk anyway, and when you turn back on your screen, you're greeted with a long missed message from Rose.

 

tentacleTherapist [TT] began pestering turntechGodhead [TG]

TT: I trust this nonsense has at least opened your eyes to the inanity of your relationship with Dirk?  
TT: Oh, you really left.  
TT: Fine, then.

tentacleTherapist [TT] ceased pestering turntechGodhead [TG]

turntechGodhead [TG] began pestering tentacleTherapist [TT]

TG: i dont even know it was him  
TG: he told me he emailed it to himself from my phone and its not like i check my sent mail so it could still be sitting on my mail server or his or god knows what   
TT: And what, praytell, do you intend to do if you call for an investigation and discover he was the person who leaked it?   
TG: i dont know   
TT: No, Dave.  
TT: The answer is "drop that shit as if it were engulfed in a blazing inferno of hellfire".  
TT: The answer is "press fucking charges".   
TG: i dont know if i even want to find out   
TT: What?   
TG: like  
TG: honestly  
TG: even if i did find out it was him  
TG: i dont know if id leave  
TG: so why bother  
TG: its just going to make me afraid of him every moment im around him  
TG: id rather just  
TG: let myself believe hes telling the truth i guess   
TT: What the fuck, Dave.  
TT: I'm reading these words over and over again, trying to comprehend what kind of a breathtakingly asinine moron you would have to be to say them.  
TT: When was my brother replaced by a completely spineless milquetoast?   
TG: thanks   
TT: No, I'm serious.  
TT: Go back and read what you just said.   
TG: i know what i said sis   
TT: No, you don't.  
TT: If you knew what you said you would understand that that is quite possibly the most idiotic thing that has ever been recorded in the history of written language, and you would have not said it.  
TT: You would have taken that thought behind the occipital lobe and blown its proverbial brains out.   
TG: its not like i dont know its stupid  
TG: it just happens to also be true  
TG: ive thought about what id do if i found out  
TG: and i dont really see it going any other way  
TG: so   
TT: What on Earth is so great about this man that you'd allow him to toy with you like this?   
TG: well  
TG: you saw the video   
TT: Get a fucking dildo, Dave.   
TG: why are you so fucking mad at me for  
TG: im the one who got screwed here   
TT: I'm just utterly befuddled by the fact you're so aware of all of this, but refuse to do anything to help yourself.  
TT: YOU are the person first and foremost responsible for your happiness and wellbeing, Dave.   
TG: yeah i know that  
TG: and thats why i havent ended it  
TG: because i dunno thatd id be happier without him   
TT: I don't think you've said a word to me about him that didn't make him out to be a horrible, abusive bastard.  
TT: I just cannot understand it. From my perspective, you look like a pitiable fool who is bringing all of this onto himself.   
TG: its not like i tell you every detail of my life  
TG: i only come to bitch to you when hes done something shitty   
TT: Then make me understand. What are the reasons you have for staying with a man who treats you the way that he does, Dave?   
TG: the reasons are stupid   
TT: Try me.   
TG: well theres the obvious ones  
TG: hes hot  
TG: big dick   
TT: Sigh.   
TG: then  
TG: the incest thing  
TG: i guess   
TT: That's a reason to NOT break up with him?   
TG: well  
TG: kinda yeah   
TT: Do you have some sort of incest fetish now?   
TG: uhhhhhh  
TG: a fetish  
TG: no   
TT: But you're "into it".   
TG: maybe  
TG: i mean i wasnt at first  
TG: but he obviously was and i guess his enthusiasm for it was infectious  
TG: theres an appeal  
TG: i guess   
TT: I'm sure it won't be impossible to find someone else to indulge you in some incest fantasy play.   
TG: that wouldnt be the same  
TG: its not like we fucking roleplay it its just sort of a thing thats there because hes ACTUALLY my brother  
TG: i call him bro sometimes but thats it  
TG: id feel ridiculous constantly having to reinforce it to keep the fantasy up  
TG: plus theres no way that shit would be able to compare after ive had the real fucking thing  
TG: ive only got the one brother  
TG: and i guess john  
TG: but i really dont want to have sex with john  
TG: ugh now im thinking about having sex with john i dont like where this went   
TT: Have you no sister fantasies?   
TG: wow im liking where this is going even less   
TT: You can't blame me for my curiosity.  
TT: When one's own brother admits to having an incest kink, it's natural to wonder exactly how far it reaches.   
TG: well  
TG: how do i put it  
TG: remember when we moved to washington after mom got married and they forced us to start going to public school   
TT: Yes.   
TG: remember how pissed we were   
TT: Yes.   
TG: ok  
TG: then youll also remember how your genius plan to get back at mom was to wear spaghetti strap shirts and refuse to shave your armpits   
TT: Oh no...   
TG: hahahaha like you actually thought threatening to go school like that would embarrass her so much she'd keep you home  
TG: but it didnt   
TT: Oh my god.   
TG: so we had to go to school anyway  
TG: and you were always the fucking one to raise your hand to answer questions  
TG: just jimmying your pits around  
TG: makin sure the whole class got a peek of those fluffy tufts   
TT: Oh god, please stop.   
TG: then on top of being the new kid i got to be the new kid with the sister with fucking arboreal underarms   
TT: Sigh.   
TG: i remember rose "sasquatch pits" lalonde  
TG: so no  
TG: i dont want to fuck you   
TT: Christ.   
TG: sorry to disappoint   
TT: It's alright.  
TT: Provided that memory doesn't drive me to suicide, I think I'll survive.   
TG: but yeah  
TG: i dunno if my thing with dirk even really counts  
TG: ive only really known him as an adult  
TG: ive got that abstract concept of bro from when i was a kid and i kinda get off on knowing hes bro but i left so young i never got to have any sasquatch pits moments with him  
TG: its like some sort of softball version of incest  
TG: i dunno if id be into it if i had grown up with him   
TT: I'm not sure how this is supposed to justify his treatment of you.   
TG: i guess  
TG: its kinda rewarding   
TT: How so?   
TG: since he treats me like shit most of the time  
TG: so when he doesnt i feel like i did something to earn it  
TG: or whatever  
TG: and i know he doesnt ever say shit for my benefit or to spare my feelings so when he does act like he gives a shit about me  
TG: its like  
TG: i dunno  
TG: its not habitual like it is with other people  
TG: jade would tell me she loved me every day and it wouldnt even register but ill just make dirk smile a little or something and i shit my pants  
TG: its really bad when its bad but its really good when its good  
TG: and if i left him im sure i could find somebody who wouldnt make me feel so shitty  
TG: but they wouldnt make me feel as good either   
TT: So you like him because he's tsundere?   
TG: oh my fucking god  
TG: did you really have to bring this conversation down to the level of weeaboo terms  
TG: you read the words that i am saying and decided it was appropriate to bring anime into this   
TT: You're the only reason I even know these words.   
TG: well apparently you havent studied your animes hard enough because dirk is not tsundere at all   
TT: I don't know anything about anime.  
TT: I thought a tsundere was a person who covers up their compassion and affection for other people by being an abhorrent bitch.   
TG: no its like  
TG: why the fuck are we talking about anime   
TT: I just want to learn my animes better.   
TG: can you learn about animes later when im not having a life crisis   
TT: Well, ok.  
TT: You were saying, then?   
TG: i dont even fucking know anymore  
TG: fuck this and fuck dirk and fuck anime  
TG: im gonna go get drunk

turntechGodhead [TG] ceased pestering tentacleTherapist [TT]


	16. Chapter 16

The world is hazy.

Your eyes flicker open, but you barely register your surroundings. You spend several moments in a stupor before you even realize what's roused you from what must have been an impressive coma; a sharp series of knocks resound through the air like gunshots, setting your head to a splitting migraine that abruptly and uncomfortably pulls you to your senses. In a shock, you pull yourself to your feet, staggering from the sleepy disorientation and the pain and then from the empty bottle of vodka you nearly trip over. The unwelcome guest at your door keeps knocking impatiently throughout it all, and you rush to the entryway desperately to make it stop.

You're breathing heavily when you wrench back the front door, and the sight on the other side is just as unwelcome as the pain in your skull. Meenah, your darling COO, destroyer of happiness, the scourge of your life, stands across the threshold, a sarcastically tight smile etched into her pursed lips. Before you can so much as greet her, her hand cuts through the air to strike you across the cheek so hard you nearly knock into the doorframe and collapse.

"The fuck was that for!?" you curse as you cradle the reddened side of your face in your hand. You glare bloody murder at her, but she only takes that as an invitation to push past you into your apartment; you groan in exasperation and pull the door shut behind her.

It's a spectacle how her posture changes the moment you and she are alone. Her shoulders slouch, her hand finds her jutted hip and her head takes a cocky tilt that exudes the all the unbridled sass of an uppity sixteen year old girl. "You fuckin' _dumbass._ "

When she had her parents' money, Meenah was able to get away with doing and saying and acting whatever way she pleased to whomever she wanted to — but when that privilege disappeared, so too did her preoccupation with rebellion and scorn for the very class she belonged to. When she was a rich adolescent with a trust fund and a college education, her informal and irreverent attitude was a quirk of character — as a destitute single mother in Los Angeles, it was a sign of stupidity, of how much of a worthless burden she was to society, and a clear indication to anyone who might be able to help her that she wasn't worth the time of day. 

It was so strange, the first time you met her again in Hollywood after college — dressed to kill, and not to aggravate her parents; all her piercings long healed over, apart from conservative studs in her lobes; with a clear voice, carefully enunciated words and the understanding that the things she says actually matter. 

Through and through it was an affectation and a facade, but one she assumed so utterly that she may as well have become the mask. In the office, with clients, anyone who knew her after she moved, even around her own daughter, she conducts herself like a professional, a woman worthy of respect and fear if not affection — you're the only person around whom she'll ever slip, but you do your best to avoid ever being alone with her all the same. It's easier when you can pretend the woman you met in Los Angeles is a different person from the girl you knew in Seattle.

You're out of luck on that front today, though. She's here, and you know better than anyone there's no convincing her to leave now.

You sigh heavily and walk past her into the kitchen. She follows behind you, arms folded over her chest with an expression of patronizing disapproval. You elect to ignore her comment to dig around in your fridge, retrieving a juice box to drink in front of her in defiant silence.

The two of you remain locked in a standoff for a time, her with a raised eyebrow and a tapping foot and you with an affectedly blank expression of nonchalance. She only speaks up again when you've emptied your juice box and crushed it your hand. "So you gonna explain what the hell got up your ass and possessed you to pull this shit?"

"Nope," you answer, making your way over to the trash to dispose of the crumpled box. You discard it, then leave the kitchen area to dump your body on the couch; Meenah groans and follows after you.

"I'm not leaving until I get my explanation," she says, now located between you and the television. Bitch.

"The hell is there to explain?" you gripe, rubbing your throbbing temples. The light hurts, and the sound of her grating voice hurts worse. "I sucked dick on camera and it got out, mystery fucking solved. Now go away."

Instead of going away, though, Meenah takes a seat on the coffee table right across from you and crosses her legs, making herself soundly at home. "I ain't goin' nowhere, you runny little cunt," she sweetly says, hands folded primly and patiently in her lap.

You groan and let yourself fall over sideways onto the couch. You twist to pull a throw pillow over to your head and bury your face in it, a welcome reprieve from the midday light. "What do you even want from me?" you whinily lament.

"Listen, that pretty little career of yours is gonna go right down the fuckin' shitter if we don't work out a plan of fucking damage control and fast. You haven't even responded yet and that's good, better that you didn't open your stupid fucking idiot mouth and ruin everything for once, but you sure as hell ain't gonna be able to run from this shit forever. When the time comes, you're gonna need a plan."

You remain immobile and speak into the pillow. "What, then?"

Meenah sits up straighter, a self-assured smirk blossoming onto her punchable face. "You're lucky this shit went down when it did. You've got a Daily Show appearance lined up for next week, yeah? You're gonna go and give 'em a little song and dance."

"God, can't I just make a fucking tweet about it or something?"

"Pfffffffffft, no," Meenah snorts. "They gotta see your face, they gotta hear your voice, and still see that _you don't give a shit._ "

"But I _do_ give a shit."

"Then ACT!" she exclaims, throwing her arms into the air for emphasis. Her eyeballs look like they're about to burst from her skull. "You got an entire persona based around not givin' a shit about anything, put it to use."

"I don't know if you noticed," you deadpan, pushing your snubbing to a more comprehensive level by rolling onto your side so your back is turned to her. "But I'm not actually that good at acting."

"God, you are such a fuckin' baby. My twelve year old daughter has bigger balls than you do."

"Then hire her to direct and produce my films instead."

"I just might, if you don't pull your head out of your ass and fuckin' deal."

With a long and heavy sigh, you pull yourself upright and turn to face her again. "Fine, you win," you concede, though your tone makes it patently clear you aren't happy about it.

Smiling sweetly in her triumph, Meenah rises to her feet. "That's a good boy," she patronizingly praises you, as if you were a dog. You glare daggers up at her.

"Will you get the fuck out of my apartment now?"

"Yeesh, no need to get all cunty about it," she says, eyebrows raised in a lazy mockery of surprise.

You just raise your arm to point to the door with your thumb.

Meenah lets loose a histrionic sigh, but collects herself all the same and wordlessly departs from your apartment. Your relief is practically tangible; as soon as you hear the door latch shut behind her, you collapse back onto the couch and return to your impotent lethargy.

Your aspirations of eternal immobility are interrupted, though, when you hear the ringtone of your phone sound out from somewhere in your bedroom. You consider just letting it ring, but you figure you may as well see who it actually is before you ignore it.

You pull yourself up off of the couch again and blindly stagger your way to your bedroom, not wanting to open your eyes and feel the searing pain of the light again. You follow the sound of the ringing and find your phone strewn somewhere on your bedroom floor; with a sigh, you bend over, pick it up, and peek open an eye to see the identity of your caller. It's Pyrope.

Collapsing onto your bed, you contemplate whether or not you really want to bother. Eventually, though, you realize you're not going to be able to ignore everyone in your life forever, so you answer the call and bring the phone to your ear. 

"I smell a laaaawwwssuuuuiiiittt," Pyrope sings out from over the phone, and you cringe. She does not have the most melodic voice.

"I don't think so," you sigh, rolling onto your side to position your back towards the light of the western wall.

Your lawyer sounds positively grief stricken. "Why not?" she asks, with all the whiny cadence of a kicked puppy. "We'll find who did this and bring him to _justice._ "

You are just too tired to deal with this shit. "Not... not this time."

"Are you gonna tell me why?"

"It's just... it doesn't really matter. I don't want to know. I'm just going to let it go. The damage is done, an investigation and lawsuit won't do anything but draw more attention to it all. All I want is for it to go away."

Pyrope makes a sound that's somewhere between a wet fart and all the air being let out of a balloon. You have to hold the phone away from your ear until she's done. "Mr. Lalonde, sometimes you are no fun at all."

"Sorry."

The call takes a detour to some more refreshingly mundane topics; you go over some routine tax issues and a bit of smalltalk, and hang up the phone feeling a little better than you did. You figure you may as well get the rest of the calls you need to make out of the way while you don't feel like complete shit. 

You dial up Eridan and strum your fingers against your bed as you wait for him to pick up. When he does, he greets you with a response even more grating and unpleasant than Pyrope's. 

"Lalonde, you piss ass drinker, why the _HELL_ were you ignorin' my —"

"Shut up, Eridan."

"But —"

"Eridan. Shut up."

Eridan makes a disgruntled noise and you allow him a moment of your silence as he stews in his own impotent rage. When he's calmed down enough to exit his state of complete inarticulacy, he complains, "The fuck do you want, then?"

You rub your forehead absently. Talking to him is always a tiresome affair, regardless of whether or not you have a recently leaked sex tape on your mind. "I want you to cancel all of my interviews and appearances through to, whatever, I guess the Oscars. Except my Daily Show gig, I'm going to that."

"But Meenah said —"

"If Meenah doesn't like it she can bend over and suck her own enormous saggy balls," you spit venomously. "I'll go on The Daily Show, but I'm not going on a fucking sex tape publicity tour. Ben can advertise the movie, I don't give a fuck anymore. I'm off the map until this shit dies off."

"Maybe you should ask —"

" _Don't give a fuck about Meenah,_ Eridan. Shut up and do what I fucking told you to do."

" _Whatever,_ " he huffs. You can hear him rifling through papers on his desk. "Don't come cryin' to me when she fuckin' wrecks your ass for this. And don't think I'm gonna forget all those fool ass things you said, hell no, I got them memorized, gonna repeat 'em right back at you so you'll know what a dumb ass shit drippin' little fuck head you are, you —"

"Thank you, Eridan," you say, and hang up.

 

***

 

You fly out to New York right on schedule. 

Everything proceeds as it always does. You just bring Aradia, and your private airline affords you some relief from scrutiny. None of the workers at the small airfield you arrive at pay you any special mind, and neither does your driver. Your first real excursion out into public since the leak doesn't quite live up to the parade of humiliation and terror you had invented in your mind.

At the Daily Show studio itself, however, you catch a few lingering looks that put you on edge. Everyone is too polite to say anything about it, though; it's almost as if the staff is affording you an unusually wide berth. You're not sure if you're imagining it. You go through all the proceedings of makeup and hair without issue until all that's left is for you to wait to go on the air.

You sit in the green room and you feel sick to your stomach. You don't think you've ever felt more nervous in your life, about anything, and the only thing that runs through your mind is how completely and utterly you're about to blow it. Your hands are trembling, your intestines feel like they're tied in a knot and it's all you can do to stop yourself from vomiting all over yourself right then and there. You have no idea how you're going to play it off in this state.

Aradia had insisted she sit with you until you go on; she notices your discomfort and places a reassuring hand on your shoulder, gently rubbing circles into the tense muscle. You look to her with something approaching gratefulness and reach out to grab a handful of candy out of the bowl on the table in the middle of the room — probably not the best choice in your current way, but if you don't do _something_ you're going to burst. You unwrap a crappy little lollipop and stick it in your mouth, hoping it'll provide some measure of comfort or distraction. It doesn't.

It's about a half hour before you're scheduled to go on when Jon comes into the green room to check up on you. You do your best to collect yourself, fix your posture, steady your trembling hands — you're not sure you manage it when you engage with his offered shake.

"All right, man," Jon says, a clearly pitying look marring his face. "You know I don't want to make you uncomfortable, but I can't not mention the video when we go on."

You lift your shades to drag your palm over your eyes and down your face. "I know," you sigh. "I would've backed out if I weren't ready to talk about it."

"All right. I won't grill you on it — we'll just get it out of the way at the start and move on to the movie shit, that sound good?"

"Yeah, that's fine. I know we usually go over but I kinda just want to get through this and get out, though, so if we could stick to just the air limit I'd appreciate it."

"I understand, yeah. It won't be that bad."

"I hope not."

Jon bids you an uneasy farewell, and you sit back down on the couch and wait. You settle into a mindless stupor as you watch the beginning of the show start through on the screen in the green room. You don't really laugh, but you don't know whether it's because the episode isn't funny or because you're shitting your pants with anxiety.

The dread wells and wells and wells until it's finally time to go on the air and there's no hiding from it any longer. A prim looking woman in a headset comes to lead you on to the stage, and you give Aradia a pitiful look as you leave to follow behind her. You stare at the woman's ass in her skirt as you trail her through the halls of the studio, because that's about the only pleasant thing in front of you at this stage.

Soon enough the woman and her nice ass have left you to stand just offstage at the final hour. You stand up straight, prim and proper, and then you remember Dave Lalonde doesn't stand up straight. You're supposed to do some sort of casual slouch, aren't you? You can't even remember what a casual slouch looks like. Everything you try seems just as stiff as anything else. You are fucking doomed. You may as well blow your brains out now rather than even bother.

Regardless of your inability to remember how to even walk, time continues to pass in a linear fashion, and you have to move out onto the stage. You hear your name called and you're given your cue and you put one foot in front of the other, pushing forward onto the brightly lit set to the same deafening cheer you've been treated to every other time. You try not to think about how you look — you just move, you just close the distance you need to close and you shake Jon's hand and keep your face stoic and blank like it's supposed to be and you take your seat like you own the place and you don't care about anything.

There's a moment of silence between you and the host that the audience is quick to pick up on. Jon looks from you, down to his script, back to you, makes a face — you try to play into it the best you can with an intently returned and expectant gaze. The audience is already laughing and neither of you have even said a word. They are very easy to please.

"Soooooo," Jon starts, and the audience is evidently already completing the joke in their heads from the sound of it. Everyone in the damn studio knows exactly what happened.

You reach for the mug of water sat in front of you and take a pointedly long drink. When you place it down again, you evenly say, "Yes. So."

"I understand you've recently taken up _film making_."

The audience is all but cracking up now. It's a Herculean effort to not bolt from the stage, but since that's not an option, you settle for telling a joke because that is what is expected of you. "Yeah, just a little hobby of mine."

"Is this something you do often?"

"What, making sex tapes or fucking men?"

 _Why is this so fucking funny to them?_ It's not even the jokes — those certainly aren't fucking funny — they're laughing at _you_. Because everything you've been through is fucking _hilarious_. Because it's _funny_ that you let a sex tape leak — what a fucking fool you are, bumbling and incompetent and incapable of keeping track of your own life! Because it's fucking _funny_ that you were with a man, you're a fucking fag and a closet case and a woman and a _joke_. The whole world is on the edge of its seat to profit from your shame and humiliation and you throw log after log into the fire because you are their _clown_ and they want to be _entertained_.

Every laugh that erupts from the stands is more mortifying than the last, but you say nothing and do nothing because you know _caring_ would mean that they win.

It seems there's some measure of mercy in your life, though; once the childish tittering of the crowd dies down, Jon simply straightens the paper on his desk with a very final, " _Well,_ then."

You almost feel a little bad about it, oddly enough — he really gave you a huge pass on it, when you know the only reason anybody is watching this interview is to hear you talk about how you sucked a dick on tape. You're sure he's going to be treated to a litany of complaints about how he let you off easy because you're friends, and while your better judgment tells you _he_ isn't going to give a fuck about it and it's not like the fucking _Daily Show_ is held to any real standard of journalistic integrity, you can't help but feel the guilt all the same.

But like fuck are you _that_ guilty about it. It's an enormous relief when you're finally able to move on to discussing the actual film. It's a standard fair interview from there; Jon asks you stock questions you have stock answers for, and you keep it tight and on point (which is a rather remarkable feat, as far as your Daily Show appearances usually go). That doesn't stop it from feeling like an eternity — by the time you walk off the stage, you are just so fucking tired it's a miracle your legs don't give way beneath you.

You don't hang around to talk with any of the staff or crew; you collect Aradia and get in your ride back to your hotel room as soon as they physically allow you to leave. You're left jetlagged, not tired enough to sleep but fatigued all the same; all you can do is collapse on your bed and rot in your immobility. Aradia lingers for a time before eventually asking you if you'll permit her to go out into Manhattan for the rest of the day — it's still pretty early, all things considered, and your flight back isn't until the morning — and you nod your assent from your face-down position on the bed. She seems to catch the meaning of the gesture well enough, given that you hear the door of the hotel room quietly shut and lock behind her.

You don't know how long you lay there on that bed. It feels like forever. You don't think of really much of anything — your brain avoids it, like it's afraid to face the depths of your own self-loathing. The hotel room descends into darkness, but you couldn't have noticed the change. You don't move again until you hear an alert from your phone, right where you'd left it in your pants pocket.

With a groan you roll over onto your back and fish the phone out of your pocket. Your sister is pestering you.

tentacleTherapist [TT] began pestering turntechGodhead [TG]

TT: I saw your appearance tonight.   
TG: i thought you didnt bother to watch any of my shit   
TT: Sometimes I do and tell you I don't just to annoy you.   
TG: thanks   
TT: No problem.  
TT: You did well.   
TG: you think so   
TT: Yes.  
TT: You kept your cool and played it off. I think the media will take the cue from you eventually.  
TT: If you don't treat it like a scandal, they'll lose interest.   
TG: will it really be as easy as that   
TT: It's hard to be absolutely certain, but from the reaction I've seen, I think so.   
TG: i havent even looked at a single response yet  
TG: ive been under complete media blackout   
TT: As far as I can tell, it's largely just surprise and run of the mill homophobia.  
TT: There's been some noise from LGBT groups irritated about you having been closeted, but that's mostly hot air.  
TT: You aren't a politician or a religious hypocrite or really anyone anybody holds morally accountable.  
TT: And you haven't actually done anything wrong. You don't have an oblivious wife on the side, and while you were obviously blazed to the deepest depths of Hell, you have a medical marijuana prescription.   
TG: oh my god you didnt seriously fucking watch it   
TT: Of course I watched it.   
TG: uggghhh rose really   
TT: Oh, please.  
TT: Don't pretend you wouldn't watch my leaked sex tape.  
TT: We are not incurious people.   
TG: id at least have the decency to lie about it   
TT: Unfortunately, I seem to lack your ineffable scruples.  
TT: Are you still in New York?   
TG: yeah  
TG: my flight back isnt until the morning   
TT: Would you like to come up to visit?  
TT: You could stay as long as you'd like, if you think getting away from it all for a while might help.   
TG: thanks  
TG: but its a really long drive  
TG: i think i just want to go home   
TT: Alright.  
TT: At any rate, that offer stands at any time, should you change your mind.   
TG: i appreciate it  
TG: im gonna go now i think i need to lay down   
TT: This'll blow over before long.  
TT: Take care of yourself.   
TG: thanks  
TG: talk to you later

turntechGodhead [TG] ceased pestering tentacleTherapist [TT]

You set your phone aside, acutely aware of the fact you're already laying down.

The more you think about what she said, the more curious you grow. You're terrified to have to face all of it, but part of you just wants to get it out of the way so you can stop worrying about it. You don't know if reading the stuff people have said about you will even make you stop worrying about it, or even not make you worry even more, but you've reached a point where you don't think it's even physiologically possible to be in a state of more worry.

Well... you can't really hide from it forever, can you?

You pull yourself up off of your bed and stumble through the darkness to the light switch, illuminating the darkened room. You cast your gaze around until you locate where you've left your bag, collect your laptop out of it, and settle back down onto your bed again. You feel jumpy and nervous as you boot up the machine, sat cross-legged and hunched forward over the computer set open in front of you. 

You bite your lip in apprehension as you open your browser; you're on edge, like you fear the screen is going to explode and sear your face off of your body. No such thing occurs, though, just the homepage of Hephaestus staring back at you.

You're not sure where to start. You don't know whether you'd rather dive into the agonizing gossip "journalism" that's no doubt sprung up around it, or just go fishing for direct comments. You're sure it won't be hard to find the video itself, if you wanted to watch it; you don't think you ever actually saw it yourself.

Starting small, you take a deep breath, open twitter, and click straight over to your interactions page.

Oh lord.

You get halfway down the page of mentions before you get a grateful distraction in the form of another alert on your phone; too lazy to actually collect it and look at it, you log in to Pesterchum invisible and to pick up the conversation from there. Your heart skips a beat when distinctively orange text appears across your screen.

timaeusTestified [TT] began pestering turntechGodhead [TG]

TT: Hey.  
TT: I dunno if you want to hear from me yet, and I'm sure you don't want to hear more about this.  
TT: But I'm pretty sure people are catching on to who I am.   
TG: what how   
TT: Plush Rump subscriptions have nearly doubled over the past week, so...  
TT: We used one of my smuppets in the video, and my dick is rather distinctive.  
TT: It wasn't long before people figured it out.   
TG: god damn  
TG: have you been getting harassed   
TT: I don't think anyone knows my actual identity yet.  
TT: They found Plush Rump, but there's nothing that could connect Plush Rump to my name.   
TG: what if somebody hacks your fucking site or something and gets all your personal information or whatever   
TT: Hahahahahahahahaha. That is not going to happen.  
TT: Even if it did, there's nothing to worry about.   
TG: that seems like a thing to worry about   
TT: No.  
TT: Everything is registered under my uncle's name.   
TG: wait  
TG: we have an uncle???   
TT: Sort of?  
TT: If you're asking why we went into foster care when we had a living uncle, he was doing time for rape when our parents died.   
TG: oh   
TT: Yeah.   
TG: uh  
TG: alright then   
TT: He's sort of a douchebag.  
TT: Or was, anyway.  
TT: He had a stroke and he's been rotting in a nursing home somewhere in Texas for the past fifteen years or so.   
TG: so what you just fraudulently registered your businesses under the name of a vegetable rapist   
TT: It's not fraudulent.  
TT: He still has enough control of his arm to sign papers.  
TT: There are no laws that say you can't own a business if you've had a stroke.   
TG: that statement is intensely dubious   
TT: He may not know what exactly he is the owner of, but I'm sure he doesn't mind.  
TT: I keep enough money in his bank account to keep him in his nice nursing home.   
TG: huh  
TG: why are you giving him money if hes such a piece of shit   
TT: Hey.  
TT: He may have been a despicable rapist, adulterer, child abuser, racist, compulsive liar, petty theft, and hated me and everything I am, but he's still my uncle.  
TT: Dunno if you noticed, but it was kinda sparse in that department for me to be trimming down.   
TG: uh ok then  
TG: arent people gonna find him though   
TT: Probably.  
TT: The hell are they gonna do, though?  
TT: He doesn't even recognize me when I visit, it's not like he's going to give up my fucking name.   
TG: couldnt they connect him to you through visitor logs or whatever   
TT: Possibly.   
TT: But I really don't think anyone with access to those or enough balls to get access to them will care long enough to bother.   
TG: but if they do find out who you are they could find out youre my brother   
TT: And how would you propose they'll manage that?  
TT: You'd need a court order to access any of the documents that would identify you as such.   
TG: they could fucking get one  
TG: since what were doing is fucking illegal   
TT: No one is going to just up and petition a court to release your original birth records on some sort of unsubstantiated premonition that we might possibly be related.  
TT: There's not even a remote reason for anyone to suspect that.   
TG: what if theres somebody who remembers us though  
TG: what if some fucking family friend or something comes out of nowhere and outs us   
TT: There are no "family friends".  
TT: Everyone else who knew Dave Strider is either dead or literally so brain damaged he has to wear a diaper so he won't shit himself throughout the day.  
TT: Stop fucking worrying.   
TG: how am i supposed to not worry about this  
TG: god fucking dammit dirk   
TT: What?   
TG: dont you think im entitled to feel a little shitty about all of this  
TG: why cant you just fucking  
TG: let me have feelings   
TT: I suppose I have a habit of assuming that you actually say things for a reason, and I forget that I'm not actually supposed to propose solutions for pointless venting and whining.   
TG: what the fuck   
TT: I was being sincere.  
TT: I'm trying to apologize.   
TG: i dont even know how to deal with you  
TG: how has this not affected you at all  
TG: are you fucking autistic or something i dont even understand   
TT: I guess because I don't really care about it, beyond whatever extent it affects you.  
TT: I don't give a shit if anyone knows I'm gay or that I'm having sex with you. The truth doesn't hurt me.  
TT: Why does it hurt you?   
TG: you just dont get it   
TT: I don't.   
TG: well  
TG: ok then  
TG: still  
TG: you dont have to get it to not give me shit every time i have the tiniest bit of emotion about anything   
TT: I only give you shit when you whine.   
TG: dirk you think fucking everything is whining  
TG: either i act like a fucking vulcan or you start shitting down my throat   
TT: Now you're just being ridiculous.   
TG: look see  
TG: youre doing it   
TT: What?  
TT: What am I doing?   
TG: that thing where i have an emotion about a thing and youre like  
TG: no stop having that emotion youre a little baby child because you have that emotion   
TT: I didn't call you a little baby child.   
TG: holy shit you ARE a literal fucking autist   
TT: I think I should go.   
TG: yeah you probably should   
TT: I'll talk to you later when you're less...  
TT: Like this.   
TG: fuck off   
TT: Well, all... right then.

timaeusTestified [TT] ceased pestering turntechGodhead [TG]

When you close out of the pester window with Dirk, it's like all of the anger you'd locked away had come flooding out — just pure, directionless rage, all dumped on top of him more because he was there than because you were angry at him. Your hands are shaking as you stare down at the still laptop in front of you, and you stay like that for a while until the fury slowly ebbs away into something bizarrely resembling guilt.

Which in itself makes you feel even more fucking guilty! You're completely justified in being angry with him — you feel like you _should_ be angry with him — but it comes and goes and recedes into a complacent longing for the status quo and you feel stupid and foolish and so very alone. You shut off the laptop in frustration and set it aside, then do your best to get to sleep.

 

***

 

You're back in Los Angeles the next day, and with it your paranoid seclusion.

You can't go outside, and you don't want to fucking know what else the internet has to say about you, so you just... sit. For a long while, you do absolutely nothing but think, but even in your depressed lethargy that becomes unbearable. You have to force yourself to do _something_.

Miraculously, you sit down and actually make some headway on the script for the next movie. Without the internet to distract you, you produce a surprising volume of content. For someone who usually gets by on deadlines with "do everything at the absolute last moment possible", being ahead of schedule is actually a very bizarre experience for you.

Aradia comes over and makes you dinner. Although she's not normally very talkative or forthcoming about much of anything, you can tell she's making an honest effort with her attempts at conversation. She doggedly brings up a number of topics you assume she's deemed suitably mundane and inoffensive, and you humor her if only because the attempt is endearing. You do feel a little better by the time she returns to her apartment for the night.

John calls you and you watch Little Monsters together on a stream. Being able to berate his taste in movies proves to be just as fun as it always was, and a welcome distraction from it all. It's not often you actually get to do much of anything with John anymore, given his oppressive schedule, so the experience is all the better for it. 

By the time your bedtime rolls around, you're not sure how you're going to make it through the next day, or the day after that. You logically know it won't be like this forever, but every minute that passes feels like an eternity and a little more than you can handle.

There's nothing to be done about it, though, so you just collapse onto your bed and wait for sleep to take you into the new day.

And wait.

And wait.

And wait.

Your mind is a fucking circus. What if it never ends? What if somebody finds out something worse? What if this is the end of your career? And to top it all fucking off, it wasn't until you got some time away that you could realize how much your bed smells like Dirk. You breathe in the scent of the sheets and you're stricken by this intense longing in the pit of your stomach — _Jesus, this is so fucking stupid._

You fucking miss him. No matter how angry at him you are, no matter how little you trust him or how much better off you'd be without him, you don't _want_ to be. You don't know if he did it — you doubt you'll ever know — but regardless of everything and every shred of sense you have, you don't want to fucking do this without him. So you don't care that it's 3:00 AM in the morning, you roll over in the blind darkness to pull your phone off your bedside table and dial his number.

Dirk picks up almost as soon as the phone begins to ring.

"Hey," you quietly say, not sure whether the softness of your voice is from the fatigue or the embarrassment of crawling back to him like this.

"Hey," he echoes. He seems as alert as he ever is; if you interrupted his sleep, he doesn't give any indication of it.

You release a long and shaky sigh. "I miss you," you say. The words feel stupid on your tongue and even stupider in the air.

"Oh," Dirk eloquently replies. There's a moment of silence between you before he seems to realize what is expected of him and adds, "I miss you too."

"Just come home," you tell him. You can't bear to hear his reply, so you hang up.

You return to the silence of darkness for a long time. You're not even sure that he'll come, but you wait, because there's nothing else that you could do. You stare at the murky grey shapes on the ceiling and contemplate nothing until you hear the sound of your apartment door opening and shutting behind its guest.

You hadn't even thought to ask him to give back his key.

You don't move from where you lay until you see the shadow of his body appear in the doorway of your bedroom. You sit up and look to him wordlessly, and he stands and stares right back. It's a moment before he steps over the threshold, and he pauses there, like he's expecting you to stop him — but when you don't, he bends over to pull off his shoes, then his socks, and then the rest of his clothes until he's stripped to his underwear at the foot of your bed. You just watch him, dead eyed.

He circles around to his side of the bed and crawls into it to take his place beside you. He seems unsure of what to do or what you want, but you're quick to pull him close to you and place yourself in his arms. You breathe out a ragged breath, and breathe in one that fills you with warmth; the tension in your body dissipates at once, and all of your worries seem distant and silly in retrospect. 

Dirk pets your hair until you fall asleep.


	17. Chapter 17

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> warning for some misogynistic language

Despite all of your fears and all of your conviction that your life would be ruined forever, everyone else turns out to be right. It... blows over.

Practically everyone you know in Hollywood comes out in public support of you at some point — you're not sure whether it's all a blatant campaign to brown nose you and curry favor, but you can't say you don't appreciate it all the same. A week turns into two, and the media outlets tire of mentioning it. By the end of a month, the internet has all but forgotten anything had even happened. You reluctantly reschedule a few of your appearances and the topic is never even raised. Sometimes you wonder if it was all just some sort of nightmare.

SBaHJ is all through post by November, just in time for your annual Christmas release. All that's left is to ramp up advertising, and in the absence of anyone giving a shit about your latest drama bomb, you return to the full swing of the media tour. By the end of the month you've been up the ass of just about every news outlet in the country. The only people left on Earth who don't already know about SBaHJ are basically just newborn babies, but you're doing your fucking damnedest to reach them.

And with the end of November comes the start of December, and with it your birthday. You take a week off touring for the occasion, but otherwise don't plan to do much on the day. You usually get a few gifts from your family and a fawning phonecall from your mother, then spend a quiet day indoors doing fuck all.

This year, though, your day comes off with an... interesting start.

turntechGodhead [TG] began pestering tentacleTherapist [TT]

TG: what the fuck is this   
TT: It arrived on schedule?  
TT: Excellent.   
TG: rose   
TT: Happy birthday, dearest brother.   
TG: rose   
TT: Do you not like it?   
TG: rose you sent me a dildo   
TT: Yes, I did.   
TG: why   
TT: I thought it would help make the decision to rid yourself of Dirk a little easier.   
TG: how is an enormous pink dildo supposed to accomplish that   
TT: Well, if you leave him, you shan't want for any stimulation.   
TG: are you seriously fucking passive aggressively sending me dildos because youre mad i wont dump my boyfriend   
TT: It vibrates.   
TG: oh god  
TG: it does   
TT: Yes, it does.   
TG: i really hate you   
TT: You're welcome.  
TT: Be sure to let me know how it goes.   
TG: rose im not going to use this   
TT: Why not?   
TG: because im not going to use a dildo my sister sent me   
TT: Oh, but you'll use the dick in your brother's pants?  
TT: That doesn't seem very fair to me.   
TG: oh my god   
TT: Family is about sharing, Dave.   
TG: no stop   
TT: It won't do for you to be picking favorites.   
TG: rose no   
TT: It's only right that John and I be allowed to fill your anus with whatever ridiculous manner of toys we like.   
TG: rose that is absolutely not how it works and you know it   
TT: Do you want me to tell Mother?   
TG: i am going to put fucking gum in you hair at christmas   
TT: You wouldn't.   
TG: im fucking going to   
TT: You can't even muster the courage to leave a man who treats you like garbage, let alone make such a proactive retaliation against me.   
TG: well i always love a good detour out of jokesville into lowblowstown  
TG: and on my birthday too  
TG: thanks sis this day is off to a great start   
TT: I don't mean to be a bitch.   
TG: well youre being one   
TT: I just feel the issue is worth pushing.   
TG: look im not going to leave him can we just drop this stupid subject   
TT: Fine.  
TT: Just so long as my opinion on the matter is clear.   
TG: yes rose you have made it an unbearably omnipresent feature of my life  
TG: i hope you feel bad because i actually sent you a real gift for your birthday tomorrow you old hag   
TT: So rude.  
TT: A dildo is a real gift.   
TG: you may as well have gotten me a box full of sass rose   
TT: My sass is a national treasure.  
TT: What did you send me?   
TG: as if im gonna tell you now bitch  
TG: you get to suffer  
TG: now im gonna go get my dick sucked just to spite you

turntechGodhead [TG] ceased pestering tentacleTherapist [TT]

 

"My sister got me a fucking dildo for my birthday," you complain as you moodily stomp into your bedroom, the offensive pink dildo flopping about in your hand. You find Dirk there after finding him absent from the living room and his own bedroom — but when you notice the two alarmingly pink shopping bags he's holding, you stop in your tracks.

"... That fuck is that," you say, narrowing your eyes in suspicion.

There's an awkward moment where Dirk remains frozen, like he's trying to figure out what to do after being caught in the midst of a plan. "I want to go out today," Dirk he eventually says, dropping the bags onto your bed.

"No, really. What's in the bags."

"I just got you something to wear tonight," he innocently replies. 

Intensely skeptical that he _just_ did anything, you stalk forward towards the bed, shove the dildo into his hands and push him aside so you can get a proper look. The instant you begin to rifle through its contents, you regret it.

"This is a skirt," you say, staring down into the bag in disbelief. "You want me to wear a skirt, in public, on my birthday."

"It's my birthday too," he declares, as if that's supposed to justify it.

"Oh," you say, looking to him. You'd entirely forgotten, but when you try to recall it, you do remember you'd always celebrated your early birthdays on the same day as his. "Yeah, it would be, wouldn't it?"

"Yes. It would be."

You sigh and look back down into the bag. "Can I not just wear this in bed or something?"

"You will, later," he answers, very matter-of-fact. He's still just sort of standing around with the dildo.

"You just need to thoroughly humiliate me first," you dryly remark.

"Yes," he says. At least he's moved past denying it.

"If I do this I want to at least eat at an actual restaurant, not fucking Arby's."

"Okay."

"And you have to wear an actual suit."

"Sure."

You weren't expecting him to even agree to any of that. "Uh, there's a Men's Wearhouse near Beverly Hills," you comment, reaching into the bag to withdraw and get a better look at your clown costume. "We can probably get you something there short notice. Probably get at least the pants hemmed same day, might have to put up with a shoddy jacket fit." 

"That's fine," he passively answers. He's being so compliant it's almost worrying.

"... That's it?" you ask, throwing another suspicious look his way. "You're not going to fight with me about it?"

"I just convinced you to crossdress in public. I know when to pick my battles."

Honestly, you don't really mind the idea all that much. It's not the first time you've been coerced into crossdressing, and the world's already fucking seen you swallow a dude's load, so it's not like getting caught in a skirt is going to make you look any more gay than you already fucking are. It could be... entertaining, even.

You finish laying out the contents of the first bag onto the bed. It's thankfully nothing especially remarkable; he picked out a rather conservative white blouse and a black skirt that doesn't seem _too_ short, though you'd have to try it on to actually see. He also picked a pair of fairly conservative black thigh-highs, which you guess solves the problem of having to shave your legs. Your hair is blond to begin with and hardly noticeable above the knee.

You've just about come to terms with the fact this won't be the most miserable experience of your life when Dirk interrupts you to hand you a shoebox he withdrew from the second bag. You reluctantly take it from him and pry off the lid; inside is a pair of the most obnoxiously red pair of fucking glittering drag queen pumps you've ever seen.

"Oh, hell no," you say, setting the box down onto the bed. You take out one of the shoes and turn it over to get a proper look at the heel; it's not _that_ big, but still enough that you know that shit is going to absolutely fucking murder your feet.

Dirk just gives you a shrug. "You'll need some kind of appropriate footwear if you'll be going out dressed like that. You can't exactly wear sneakers to a five star, now can you?" he sardonically remarks.

"It's not like I could wear the _rest_ of that to a fucking black tie. We'll be doing a business casual joint at most."

He seems perplexed and fatigued by the concept of dress codes in general. "What's wrong with it? It's not like it's slutty."

"You can't wear separates to black tie," you lecture him, like he should know all of this already. "Chicks can get away with a lot but it still has to be at least a cocktail dress, decent length. I'm just going to look like a librarian in this. I could get away with flats at business casual."

"Will you just wear the fucking hooker heels so I can get off on it?" he sighs, forgoing rational persuasion entirely.

"You are a dick."

"Sorry to hear that. Now try those on."

With an aggravated groan, you begin the process of removing your clothes. When you've stripped down to your underwear, Dirk suddenly appears to remember something and fishes through the second bag. You know it's coming, but it's not any less exhausting when he tosses the nauseatingly girly fire-truck red panties into your hands.

"Really?" you complain as you hold the offending article at arm's length, like it's hazardous waste. 

"Yes," is all Dirk provides.

You can tell your junk isn't going to fit into this thing. Your expression makes sure he is patently aware of how much you'd like to punch him in the face as you drop your pants and replace them with the anatomically inappropriate attire. You are extremely right; they're uncomfortably tight, and you'd probably have a serious slippage issue if your dick so much as decided to twitch of its own accord.

Dirk, of course, has elected to ignore your discomfort in favor of staring lecherously at your package. You give him an exasperated look before hurriedly moving to grab the skirt off the bed; stepping into that at least gives your dick some reprieve from his piercing gaze. You quickly pull on the blouse over that and securely button it up. You are very quick to notice something critical missing.

"Shouldn't I get a bra and stuff it or something?" you say, looking down at your conspicuous lack of breasts.

"You'll just be flat. I don't wanna look at you with tits," Dirk answers, like the suggestion were utterly ludicrous.

"What a heterophobe."

"You'd look fuckin' weird with tits, is all. Shit don't run in our family."

"Fine, whatever," you say. The curiosity eventually gets to you; you move over to stand in front of the mirror.

You smooth down the front of the blouse, turning to shamelessly admire yourself. You... don't make that bad of a girl, actually. You're still kind of obviously a dude, but you think you could make yourself look more like a girl who looks kinda like a dude with the right makeup. The clothes fit you surprisingly well — suspiciously so, even. "How did you even know my sizes?"

"I took measurements while you were passed out during your last alcohol binge," he casually answers. Nothing creepy about that at all.

"... _Really,_ dude?" 

"Someone who drinks fucking appletinis doesn't deserve privacy or respect."

"You don't even drink at all! You don't get to insult _my_ manhood."

"Pretty sure I get to do whatever I want," he says, then tosses you a headband he must have procured from the bag while you weren't looking.

You catch it on reflex, but you look down at it like he'd just thrown you a steaming turd. "You've got to be kidding me."

"No," he says, like he doesn't see anything odd about this at all.

"Are you dressing me up as my fucking sister?" you hiss, gawping at him in a paradoxically unsurprised disbelief. You should've picked up on it sooner — apart from the gaudy heels, everything he picked out for you could've been taken straight out of your sister's closet.

"Maybe," he cagily answers, folding his arms across his chest. "What's it to you?"

"I'm not going out dressed at my fucking sister. That's weird as hell, dude."

"How is it weird?"

You don't even know how to deal with this guy. "Because she's my sister???" you propose, gesticulating your profound discomfort.

"I don't really think it's any significant measure more weird than having sex with your brother, but all right," he says, holding out his hand to take the headband back.

"That's not —" You give up midsentence, groan, and eagerly pass it off to Dirk. He takes it from you without further complaint and drops it back into one of the bags. You suppose you ought to count yourself lucky on this one. "Okay, give me the stupid fucking shoes."

Dirk seems rather surprised at your assent; nevertheless, he refrains from commenting and simply retrieves the terrible footwear to hand off to you. You grumble in discontent as you slip them onto your feet — of course they fit, it would be utterly beyond Dirk's all encompassing autismus for him to have been in error — and settle into the miserable process of standing in heels. You already feel uncomfortable and you haven't even taken a step. You have absolutely no fucking idea how women put up with these things.

"You look very nice," Dirk supplies.

"Fuck you, buddy."

Rather than stick around to hear his retort, you turn and uneasily stagger your way to the bathroom. Dirk, of course, follows right after you. "What are you doing?" he asks.

"If I'm actually going to look like a chick, I'm going to need makeup," you say, pulling open a drawer by the sink to withdraw a case full of the garbage.

Dirk puts that case under so much visual scrutiny you'd think you were being scanned by the TSA. "You just... have this shit laying around."

"I use it," you say, raising an eyebrow. "Have you... not noticed... ?"

You've never seen a more confused man in your life.

"I at least use foundation and concealer when I go out. I wear mascara most of the time even at home, because my eyelashes are blond," you attempt to explain, to his mounting perplexion.

"What the fuck?"

"You've seriously never noticed," you state disbelievingly. "I seriously look like a fucking ghost without mascara, I don't even understand how you could miss it."

It's like he's begun to hurt himself in confusion. You just watch in mild amusement as he screws up his face and starts going on like, "Holy fucking shit, you are so fucking gay. God fucking damn."

"I'm a celebrity," you defend yourself. "If I don't fucking wear makeup I get gossip columns centered around how I must have a meth addiction."

"So unbelievably fucking gay —"

"Yes, I have sex with a man every fucking day and I'm currently standing here in a skirt, I think it's been established that I am a fucking fag. Can we move past your fourteen year old masculinity crises?"

Dirk just looks at you with this perturbed squint-eyed expression and you eventually give the fuck up. You sigh dramatically, turn away from him and open the makeup case.

You have his rapt attention as you begin the process of applying concealer and foundation. It's like the concept of a man wearing makeup is so utterly foreign to him that seeing it unfold before his eyes is some sort of tremendous event. You do your best to avoid being agitated by his scrutiny.

You're a bit more thorough with it than you usually are — for the most part you just try to eliminate blemishes and signs of age for daily use, but you find you're able to even out your skintone a lot with more diligent application. It makes you look smoother and more feminine already. You could probably stand to pluck your eyebrows down to actually pull it off, but that would likely result in Dirk having an aneurysm and also be a strange new look for the media to digest. You try to do what you can to downplay the region with concealer, but you're just gonna have to put up with being sort of... browy.

Mascara you're already pretty heavy-handed with, and you really go overboard now, exacerbating the ridiculousness with a ring of over-the-top raccoon eyeshadow. By the time you finish with eyeliner you look like Kesha's confused little brother.

"I know you don't wear _that,_ " Dirk objects when you produce a stick of appallingly bright red lipstick. "Why do you have _that?_ "

"Some Discovery producer gave Jade this enormous set of lipstick but she never used it so I just kept it when she moved out," you evenly answer as you apply the offending makeup to your lips. "Bet he'd love to know it's gone to a great cause like this." There's a lot of stuff of Jade's you kept. Someone would probably think it's creepy.

You're not really sure what else to do with yourself beyond what you've done. While your knowledge of makeup is apparently enough to send Dirk into paroxysms of homophobia, you really don't have particularly much skill with it beyond the very basics. You think you look well enough, but it's not _quite_... you can't even place it.

"I don't know what to do with my hair," you similarly lament, this time aloud. Your hair is a fairly short length, and you've only really ever used one hairstyle. Your mother taught you more about hair styling than you'd like to admit, and Jade was so inept at it you'd become an effective expert on doing hers, but you've never really done... much of anything with your own hair. The only thing that'd suit its length would be basically be a bit shorter of a version of the hairstyle Rose likes to use, and this is already excessive levels of incestuous without _that_ on top of it. And you already put on makeup before even thinking of doing anything with it, so you figure that's shot.

"It looks fine as it is," Dirk says, however little stake you place in his abhorrent fashion sense.

You just take a comb and brush your bangs forward, which at least leaves you a little less clean-cut looking than you usually are. The makeup you've caked on is trashy enough that it sort of works. 

"Well, so long as nobody actually looks at me I think I'll make a pretty decent chick," you proclaim, unable to figure out anything else to do.

Dirk gives you a long and critical look before pronouncing, "I think you pass."

"Really?" you say, peering back into the mirror. "I don't know, I can still tell I'm a guy."

"That's because you're you, and you know you're a dude in drag. Nobody else is going to be paying that much attention."

"I guess," you concede, skeptical though you are. Apparently finished, you turn and push past Dirk to the bedroom and set about collecting your things to go.

You've gathered your wallet, keys and phone in your hands before you find yourself arrived at a critical dilemma. Your skirt is notably bereft of any pockets. "Shit," you say. "I don't have anywhere to put my shit."

"Sure you don't have a faggoty little man purse stashed anywhere?" Dirk dryly drawls, and you throw him a scathing look in return.

"No, I don't have a faggoty little man purse stashed anywhere. I guess I could just bring my laptop bag —"

"Here, I have plenty of pocket space. Just let me take them," Dirk sighs, holding an outstretched hand. When you hesitate, he quirks a brow.

It's not like you really fear for the loss of a few hundred bucks from your wallet, and there's nothing on your phone you don't want him to see, but you have such a basic distrust of him that you recoil even at the offer. You eventually hand your stuff over, though, and content yourself with pretending nothing had happened.

"We might as well go out and get your suit, then," you say, in absence of anything else. "I guess we'll see just how good I am at being a chick."

"That we will."

 

***

 

You arrive at the Men's Wearhouse at around one and with it all of your second thoughts. The reality of having to go into public dressed as a woman is a bit more daunting than the fantasy. You've crossdressed before, but never... _in fucking public,_ surrounded by human beings with eyes and judgments and _holy shit this is going to be all over the media, isn't it?_

You don't say anything, though, and instead express your anxiety by mercilessly nagging Dirk. "You remember what I told you to say, right?" you natter as the two of you make your way across the parking lot.

"Yes," Dirk sighs. You have your arm linked through his, since you are not exactly a paragon of balance. "I think I can manage to order a fucking suit."

"It's more complicated than —" You immediately cut yourself off in paranoia when you hear the door of a car in the lot slam shut. You don't want anyone to hear your voice — no amount of makeup was going to fix _that_. Dirk just snorts and pulls you along to walk a little faster, and it's all you can do to not fall flat on your fucking face.

You make your way into the shopping center and locate the actual store shortly after. You're nervous when you walk in, more due to your lack of confidence in Dirk's ability to handle interpersonal interaction than anything else.

"I'd like to purchase a suit on short notice," Dirk forcefully announces to the first store worker he finds, with you still ungracefully attached to his arm. You freeze up when the man's eyes sweep over you, but it's a relief when his gaze doesn't linger; he just eagerly turns to Dirk to assist.

"Of course! Do you know what you're looking for in a suit?"

Well, apparently he _fucking can't_ manage to order a suit, because Dirk looks like he's hit a blank. You screw up your face in frustration and anxiously reach up to hiss in his ear, "You want a single breasted two-button notched jacket with a central vent, flat front pants." _This_ earns you an odd look from the salesman.

Your lout of a brother awkwardly looks back to you and just as clumsily repeats back what you just said, looking much like a lost little child. Oh god, you wish you could just talk. This would be so much easier if you could do all of this for him.

To his credit, the man does his best to be unperturbed by your strange arrangement and replies, "I'm sure we can find a number of suits that will meet your needs. Do you know your sizes?"

Dirk's mouth opens and closes. _God fucking dammit_. You imagine you look like you're going to murder someone when you have to whisper in his ear again, "Just ask them to bring out someone to take your measurements."

"Can I get measured or something?" Dirk manages, looking between you and the worker with uncertainty. That dude really must think something weird is going on now. Nevertheless, he confirms that they can in fact take Dirk's measurements, and he leads the both of you over to an area towards the back of the shop. You're left alone for a moment — which you savor in order to glare at Dirk with all of the loathing you can muster — before another man returns with the salesman to assist you, apparently the tailor. He seemed hurried and unpleasant and doesn't say much, but runs through Dirk's measurements all the same. Being bossed about and told to do this and that seems to leave your brother rather flustered.

As Dirk is being measured, you notice something rather... strange about the salesman who'd lingered around the general area to wait for you to be done. Is he... looking at you?

You wander over to a nearby chair and seat yourself on the edge of its arm, which raises and exposes one of your legs. _He is totally looking at you._

It's not long before Dirk, too, is looking at you. Or rather, he's looking at how the shop worker is looking at you, and then how you're looking at _him,_ and then the way you start looking at the dude even harder when you notice Dirk has noticed, and he's lucky for his shades because otherwise his eyes would be bursting from his skull. And there's nothing he can do about it, with his arms raised up and a measuring tape around his chest. 

You elect to be a little shit. You wink at the salesman, who smiles and looks away from you bashfully. Dirk looks like he's struggling to not punch out the tailor so he can beat the shit out of that dude. You feel... kinda hot.

The moment the tailor has finished with the measurements, Dirk excuses himself and leaves the bewildered tailor and salesman to grab you by the elbow and drag you around the corner of a nearby wall.

"You're _flirting_ with him," Dirk hisses. Oh god, he is so jealous it is _adorable_.

"What's it to you?" you fire back under your breath. You try to twist to peek around to the other two men, but Dirk roughly pulls you right back.

"You're supposed to be doing this for _me_ , not random fucking dudes in shitty suit stores —"

"Excuse me, is there a problem?"

Both you and Dirk jump when the salesman appears beside you. Dirk quickly releases your elbow and answers, "No, not at all. Me and my _wife_ —" He looks _very pointedly_ at the man. "— were just arguing about what color suit I wanted."

Hahahahaha, oh god, this dude is trying to _save_ you. He takes on a very stern expression, standing tall — even though he's easily five inches shorter than Dirk — and asks, "Is that an argument that requires you to _assault_ her?"

"Assault her, what the fuck —"

The worker ignores Dirk, addressing you directly. "Ma'am, are you all right? Would you like me to —"

"She's _fine,_ " Dirk angrily objects. You've never seen him so mad.

"I think she can speak for herself!"

You can, in fact, speak for yourself, but somehow you think this situation would become much worse if you did. Dirk looks like he's about to snap the other man in half over his knee, and _he_ looks stupid enough to actually challenge him. You do your best to restrain Dirk, though you know that won't do any good if he actually wanted to start some shit.

All the noise attracts a manager before long. The incredibly flustered salesman tries to explain his side of the story, but the manager dismisses and shoos him away before offering Dirk a gracious apology. "Sir, I'm terribly sorry for the behavior of my employee. He had no business presuming as he did. Now, can I assist you in your purchase today?"

Feeling vindicated, Dirk runs through the suit specifications again with some confidence — he at least remembered this time — and the manager quickly takes you through the store to find a suitable match. You find a couple that look all right, and have Dirk try them on — his long ass arms make finding a jacket that fits difficult, and your very short notice requirement rules some of the more drastic alteration you'd need out. You end up settling with a jacket that's sort of long, with pants that are _definitely_ too long, but getting those fixed up they could manage on the same day. The manager, apparently fucking deaf, tries to convince you to wait it out and buy a suit that would fit better after being re-cut, but Dirk flashes him enough cash that he shuts up and puts the tailor to work. With actual time for alterations, you'd have bought him a suit much better than some trash from fucking Men's Wearhouse. You glower in frustrated disdain of your inability to express this to anyone. You have feelings about suits.

They also sell you a shoes, a tie, a dress shirt and a proper belt, all of which Dirk had lacked. They tell you to come back at nine to pick up the altered suit, and you urge Dirk to keep counting out bills until the time drops to six.

That still leaves you with quite a bit of time to kill — but when you stop to ponder a suggestion, you're interrupted by Dirk taking you by the arm again and hauling you through the halls of the shopping center until he locates a bathroom. Your worries about being seen in a men's bathroom dressed like this should probably not be your most pressing concern.

No one witnesses your entry, though. No one seems to be in the bathroom at all, which is rather fortunate, because Dirk elects to push you bodily into a stall, lock the door and brutally slam you against the divider with his mouth against yours.

"If you ever touch another man, I'll fucking kill you," he pants out against your skin, and he says it so sweetly that you nearly miss the meaning of the words. You don't know if the scariest part is that you don't doubt for a second that he means it, or that you don't even really care if he does.

"Fuck you," you spit back, and Dirk answers you with a savagely harsh kiss. He bites down onto your lip and you're pretty he's drawn blood, but you don't even give a fuck; you fist your hand in his hair and kiss him back and meld your body against his, grinding your growing and now uncomfortably positioned erection against his thigh. With nowhere else to go, your dick had decided to escape from the waistband of your panties — the sensation of the fabric of his pants rubbing against you just about drives you mad, and you're left about a hair's breadth away from begging him to fuck you in the bathroom stall.

Begging actually requires having a free mouth, though, which you notably lack. You settle for gyrating desperately against him when he replaces his thigh with his palm, and struggle to keep quiet when he slips his hand beneath your panties to begin rhythmically stroking your dick.

He allows you a reprieve then, and as soon as you break away from his mouth you resort to panting into his shoulder and clinging to him for dear life. He picks up the pace, squeezing you firmly and twisting his wrist and milking you of all you're worth until you're reaching closer and closer and —

At once he stops. He pulls his hand away, pins your own against the wall of the dirty stall and silences your protests with a long and invasive kiss. You're left to tremble feverishly in denial, desperately trying to make contact and grind yourself against him so you can finish, but he resolutely denies you any contact until you've well backed away from the edge. At that point, rather than electing to continue, he pulls back from the flushed and flustered mess you've become, politely pulls up your panties, and then pronounces, "Let's go shopping."

You gape at him stupidly for several moments. Dear fucking Christ in Heaven, you want to _murder this man._ But murdering him would mean he wouldn't be able to get you off, so when he grabs you by the hand and pulls you out of the bathroom, you have no choice but to comply.

You walk along beside him in shock for a while, unable to think about anything but your fucking enormous boner you are sporting. On top of being intensely uncomfortable and a little painful, it's probably fucking obvious you have an erection to anyone who fucking happened to walk by.

But nobody notices. You just keep walking, and walking, and walking, and eventually your boner decides it's time to quit, and all that's left is Dirk and his hand in yours.

Huh. You can... do that. You're just sort of holding his hand and nobody cares or so much as gives you a second look. You don't think you've ever even held his hand before — certainly not where anyone could see. It's very warm, and much larger than yours, and roughed by calluses you're suddenly stricken with an urge to coerce him to file off, and for some stupid fucking reason the only thing you can think about.

You're only pulled to your senses when Dirk bodily pulls you into a store. He seems to be intent on convincing you to buy _more_ women's clothing, as if this is going to be a _regular thing_ — and you argue with him about it in the middle of the store until you realize the looks your under-the-breath hissing draws from the other shoppers and floor workers is more embarrassing than just giving him what he wants.

This at least provides you with an opportunity to buy some shoes that don't fucking murder your feet to walk in. And a dress you can actually wear to black tie. And also some perfume maybe? Aren't girls supposed to smell nice? By the time you're done you've produced another four bags of shit and the realization you've completely lost control of your life.

In absence of anything else to do until the alterations are finished, you convince Dirk to go home so you can change, and then become very disgruntled when he refuses to fuck you. You lock yourself in the bathroom and try to masturbate but he picks the lock, stops you from finishing, and then manhandles you back into the car where you are forced to pout all the way back to the Men's Wearhouse.

You pick up Dirk's suit, and it's okay. The jacket is still kind of long, but the pants fit him all right with the alterations. You'd be shitting your pants if you actually had to take him anywhere that mattered, but for a restaurant you've never been to and have no intention of returning to, it'll do.

You... actually have no idea where to go, so you make Dirk pull over on the side of the road while you look through Yelp reviews on your phone. He complains loudly the entire time, bitching and moaning about _why can't you just go to fucking Olive Garden,_ and you have to stop and yell at him for fifteen minutes in abject disgust. He is eventually cowed by your assiduous disdain of Olive Garden, and takes up the moody pouting torch until you find a place that's sufficiently upscale, expensive, and far enough away from any of the areas you regularly frequent that you can be reasonable certain you won't run into anyone you know. And has a menu in _English,_ as Dirk very stubbornly demanded.

You have Dirk call about reservations, and they, of course, have to regretfully inform you that they have no vacancies for the evening — that tune is quick to change when Dirk acquaints them with the depths of your wallet, however.

You try to explain to Dirk basic restaurant etiquette on the drive over. His eyes glaze over right around the point where you get to the process of wine tasting and you don't think he catches a single word from there. When you start on about how to properly present yourself to the customary restaurant mohel and he just replies with "mhmm," you give up.

You arrive just in time for your newly weaseled reservation, but they still have to ask you to wait. You'd complain if you hadn't probably just stiffed somebody else on their reservation to get it. And also if you weren't wearing drag. You stand outside and grumble quietly to yourself for the twenty minutes it takes for the stupid puck they gave to to vibrate, and then make your way back into the restaurant. A very harried-looking hostess takes you to be seated, and an equally stressed waiter comes to take your orders after a considerable wait. You're not mad about that one, at least — you had to practically wrestle with Dirk to get him to just fucking pick something to eat without complaining about how expensive and "froofy" it is. You're arguing about whether or not froofy is even a word when the wine you ordered comes along, and the annoyed expression he gives you throughout the pouring and tasting reminds you of just how very little has changed.

Just as you're nearly convinced this evening won't be a complete disaster, your blood freezes in your veins when the last voice you ever wanted to hear sound out from behind you.

"... Dave?"

You don't turn. You don't react. You pray to fucking _God_ that she doesn't press the issue and that she just fucking _leaves_ and —

"Well, I'll be," Meenah says, walking out around your table to get a proper look at you. The degree of sadistic mirth on her face is immeasurable. 

"Keep your fucking voice down," you hiss, glancing around the restaurant frantically. Meenah and Dirk both don matching smirks of the most smug caliber imaginable; the similarity of their utter glee in your humiliation is uncanny.

To your horror, instead of leaving you to your fucking business, Meenah pulls one of the chairs out from a recently vacated table next to yours and sets herself up a place at yours. You have to try very, very hard to not implode from the embarrassment.

"What are you doing here?" you ask urgently, careful to keep your voice hushed. She just snickers at the effort.

"Oh, I'm just here with my daughter," she says, looking back over her shoulder to at table towards the other end of the restaurant. You follow her gaze and spot Feferi there — she doesn't seem to miss her mother much, as you can see her talking animatedly on her cell phone in between shoveling forkfuls of food into her mouth. When you look back to Meenah, her gaze is trained intently upon you; as soon as she catches your eye, she purrs, "You always did clean up well."

It's a combination of the strange sexual confidence your getup imbues you with and your currently _intense_ desire to spite Dirk's glowing amusement with this entire situation that spurs you to a response rather uncharacteristic of your frosty relationship with Meenah. "Not half so lovely as you," you reply, the tame words laced with a tone that's positively salacious. It's true, even; she's dressed in an almost radiantly magenta evening gown, but she carries and projects herself with such confidence and bravado that its loudness seems befitting rather than garish. Her long hair is wound into a pair of tight braids that invoke a nostalgia fond enough to dull the edge of more recent and bitter memories.

Both Dirk and Meenah seem a bit surprised by your reciprocity — but where Dirk's grin twitches south towards a scowl, Meenah's mirth quickly rebounds tenfold. It's been a long, long time since you've willingly played her game.

Before Meenah can escalate the matter, though, Dirk clears his throat in his patently apparent jealousy. "Don't you have a child to be looking after?" he ever-so-politely suggests. His tone is tight and constrained, but the venom is intensely implicit even in its omission. 

"I'm sorry, who the _fuck_ are you?" she answers, as if noticing his presence for the first time. She cocks her head to the side with the fakest pursed-lipped smile you can imagine.

 _Oh god,_ this is not going any kind of pleasant place. The fucking cats are out now — even with his shades obscuring his eyes, you know all too well that searing, loathsome look behind them that he has trained on Meenah. Meenah, of course, is pathologically incapable of not being a cunt, and answers Dirk's challenging body language with obstinate defiance.

"He's probably right," you say, trying your best to defuse the situation. Meenah looks about ready to argue, but she can't help but throw a glance Feferi's way before she does — the kid's done with her phone, now, resigned to quietly eating alone.

You catch her looking and she catches you catching her looking and some odd look of embarrassment crosses her face, but in the end, not being a completely shit mom wins out over tormenting you and having the last word. She rolls her eyes and bids you a sarcastically fond farewell, then departs to attend to her daughter at last.

"How did she even recognize you?" Dirk muses once she's gone. It seems his anger is currently a less pressing issue than how funny he thinks you being caught is.

"I, uh. This isn't... the first time I've done this."

"Ha. I figured as much."

"Yeah," you grumble, busying yourself with a sip of your wine.

"Didn't think you'd be the type man enough to do this shit in public without someone to force you, though."

"I wasn't. We —" You spare a glance to the table across the room where Feferi and Meenah are sat. "Uh. Dated for a while."

Dirk's eyebrow shoots up. "That cunt? I thought you hated her," he says, sounding almost genuinely surprised. Oh, how little he knows about just how deep this bullshit runs.

"Yeah, wasn't always that way. Just imagine me at seventeen and it'll be clear enough how, I'm sure," you sigh, slipping your feet out of your shoes under the table. Fuck propriety — even the new ones that were supposed to make your feet hurt less still fucking hurt. "Hell, you're lucky for her. If she hadn't forced me to suck other dudes' dicks for her entertainment back when I was still an impressionable teenager you'd still be wrestling with a mountain of repression and some kind of obnoxious fidelity to heterosexuality I'd probably have committed to," you dryly add.

"Pretty sure I still was up to the point that video leaked."

Something about the way he said that gives you pause, but you can't tell whether you're just being paranoid or what. If he did it, was that why? He'd seemed pretty annoyed by how you wanted to keep your relationship secret. Was it to purposefully out you so you'd have to acknowledge him publicly?

You're distracted from the awkward shift in mood at the table when the waiter arrives with your food. You're surprised to discover it's actually pretty good, although Dirk's incessant complaining about how it fucking _looks_ sours the whole deal considerably.

"This shit is just going straight into my face, I don't understand why they go through all this fucking trouble to make it look like some pretentious fucking art piece. Do they think I'm some sort of fag ass baby who cares about that shit?"

"The clientele of this place usually is the sort of fag ass baby who cares about that shit, yeah. Also I'm pretty sure you care more about it than they do given how fucking long you've been whining about this, holy shit."

"I'm not whining," he objects, finally just cutting into his meat to stuff it into his mouth. He chews with his mouth open like some sort of petulant taunting child; the sight of the meat's grey, ruined insides sloshing about in his mouth makes you shudder.

He swallows, calls you a baby and sticks out his tongue.

 

***

 

On your trip back to the car, you are quick to discover that you had had more than your fair share of wine to drink that evening. Discombobulated enough in heels _without_ the influence of alcohol, you have to lean on Dirk all the way through the parking lot. The alcohol also seems to have disinhibited your vocal centers, which earns you many an odd look from passerbys who happen to catch your very male-sounding complaints of "man I didn't even drink that much" and "gonna need you to fuck it out of me, hehehehehe" and "I'm so horny I could go down on an entire football team right now".

"You're a fucking drunk, that's your problem," Dirk grumbles as he roughly shoves your body into the passenger seat of the car.

You have to flounder dumbly for your bearings before you can protest. "I'm drunk, not _a drunk,_ " you say, fumbling with your seatbelt. "Normal people get drunk. You're the fuckin' freak with your, with your _sobriety._ Stick in the mud, good for nothin' —"

Dirk settles into the driver's seat of your car and gives you the most condescending look you have ever seen in your life. "If you could fuckin' see yourself right now you wouldn't be arguing with me."

"Huh?" you hastily bluster out, scrambling to pull down the passenger side visor to inspect yourself in its mirror. "Did my makeu—"

Dirk interrupts you with a loud groan followed by the ignition. "Just shut the fuck up."

"I'm not even that drunk. I can still form sentences. I can _show_ you fucking drunk."

"Shut up, Dave."

"All I had was a couple of glasses of wine, I could still _drive_ —"

"Dave, shut up."

You spend the rest of the long drive home pouting.

When you arrive home, there is only one thing on your mind. You hang off Dirk shamelessly on the walk up to your apartment complex, grope him clumsily in the elevator shaft, and all but drag him back to your bedroom when you've made it back into your apartment. You're upon him the moment you're alone, peppering his obstinately unresponsive face with sloppy kisses. Even more sloppy are your pitiful attempts to undress him — you push doggedly on his jacket until you've forced it off, but your clumsy attempts at unbuttoning his shirt are less than successful. _God damn,_ you really _didn't_ have that much to drink — you don't know why you've suddenly lost half of your hand-eye coordination. "C'mon, help me out here. Wanna fuck." You try kissing him and miss, but that is owed to a deliberate evasion on his part.

"You smell like shit, I don't wanna kiss you," Dirk brusquely announces, shoving you off.

You stumble on your shitty heels, but miraculously manage catch your balance and incredulously protest, "Dude, you've kissed me after I've literally _licked your ass._ "

"Yeah, sorry. Shit tastes more pleasant than your grody booze stank."

"All I've had is _wine,_ " you complain, and give him a hard shove back. You doubt you'd be able to upset his balance without his consent, but he lets himself fall into a seat on the edge of the bed.

"Fine then," he says, giving you a look that blatantly displays that you are not going to like his terms of assent. He pats his knee. "Come here."

You just sort of stand there in confusion.

"You've been a very bad girl," he informs you after you're slow to catch on, and when you finally realize what he's trying to do you can't help but laugh.

"Seriously, man?" you snort, crossing your arms across your chest. Like hell are you going to —

Dirk decides to answer your irreverence with force. At once he lurches up from his seat on the bed, intent etched in every inch of his face, and something suspiciously like genuine fear pulses through you. You freeze in place as he stalks towards you; when he grabs you around the back of the neck and pulls you towards him, all you can do is blindly stumble where he wants you. Which proves to be bent over his knee with your skirt flipped up over your back. You barely even know what's hit you before he _really_ hits you.

" _Fuck!_ " you cry out as his palm strikes you across your ass. He does not fucking hold back — it seriously fucking _hurts_ and leaves your flesh raw and stinging and probably alarmingly red. And he doesn't wait for you to recover before he strikes you again.

"Fucking whore," he serenades you, and you're almost too perturbed to even know how to react.

"What the fuck are you ev _FUCK JESUS_ —" 

While he certainly doesn't relent, Dirk's blows begin to grow a little more... handsy. He'll strike you and then shift his hand to run his fingers over your ass and taint and between your thighs to squeeze your balls, rub his palm in firm circles over the cheeks of your exposed ass — and eventually that stinging pain almost becomes...

Your exclamations of pain grow a little more breathy, and you grow a little less resistant to his attention. Each time his palm connects with your flesh, you feel a little jolt through your body; it's an odd feeling, not quite what you'd call pleasure, but you'd hardly call it _unpleasant_. And your dick, for whatever reason, really seems to be getting a rise out of it.

Before long you're fully hard again, your aching member pressed painfully against Dirk's thigh. He decides to make matters worse when he pulls your panties down to around your knees, leaving nothing between your skin and the fabric of his pants — you jostle against him every time he hits you and it's fucking _torture_.

"Just fuck me already, _Christ_ ," you grit out. The man is a criminal fucking tease.

"Such a fucking slut," he mutters ridiculously, and spanks you again.

"Yes, yes, I'm an enormous fucking cumslut and I love daddy's massive dick in my loose filthy boypussy, can we fuck now?"

Dirk stops. "You're going to make me lose my erection," he complains.

"Oh, fuck off."

And he does just that — at least, he shoves _you_ off, and then crawls across the bed to reach the bedside table and procure your lubricant. You kneel on the bed and antsily await his return; he quickly does, and is even more hasty to force you to resume your previous position across his knee. Thankfully, this time, he only gives you a light slap between smearing lube onto his fingers and setting into tormenting your ass.

He rubs slow and lazy circles around and over the ring of muscle of your ass, and despite your enthusiastic attempts to push up into his hand, he seems resolute to keep things progressing at a snail's pace. He'll dip the tip of his finger in and just as soon as you're sure the torture is over, he'll withdraw and resume being an incorrigible fucking tease.

" _Please,_ " you beg him, this time skipping all pretense of dignity. Instead of arguing you plead with him shamelessly and arch up into him and whimper like a fucking bitch in heat, and that at last finally seems to be the ticket.

When he finally sinks his first finger in to the knuckle it's an enormous relief on its own, though obviously little satisfaction. You bite your fist and do your best to be fucking patient as he pushes that single finger slowly in and out; when he finally adds the second, you release a long and shuddering breath.

Evidently growing a little more direct, he hooks his fingers and goes straight for your prostate. He thrusts in, rubs it directly, slowly drags out; you're just about to go completely fucking insane. He starts to stretch you out in earnest when he works in the third, but even then he lingers far longer than you know he needs to fuck you. You're an old fucking pro at this point, you don't need this much prep. All he's doing is fucking toying with you and there's nothing you can do about it.

And then he decides to _really_ toy with you.

At once Dirk withdraws his fingers, and when you can feel him leaning and twisting back to grab something off the bed, you turn your head around to have a look. You catch one glimpse of the thing grasped in his hand and you are fucking _done_.

"Oh, come on, you can't be serious, that thing was from my fucking _sister_ for fuck's —"

Dirk does not listen to you. Instead, Dirk lubes up the toy, shoves it straight up your ass and turns the vibe on full blast.

"Oh _GOD,_ " you pitifully choke out, all but set into erratic convulsions. Your immediate reflex is to curl up into a ball from the intensity of the sensation, but your position across Dirk's knee impedes that. You're left with no option but to ride it out as the vibrations pulse through your body, and oh god it is _too fucking much_. You don't even know how to describe the sensation — it feels so fucking good but you can't take it, it's like your hand's being held to the fire and it _sears_ but he won't let you pull away.

When Dirk takes a firm grip of the toy and begins to slowly pump it in and out of your body, you don't even know what to do. It's fucking _big_ , on top of it all; it's certainly longer than Dirk's dick, if not as thick, and you're sure it alone would have been more than enough to drive you nuts. All you can do is keen witlessly, writhe and kick and squeeze your thighs together, but nothing that you do deters him.

It seems like it would at least be some measure of mercy that the toy would bring you to a quick release, but he denies you even that. As soon as you're close to painfully, painfully come, he pulls out the toy and tosses it carelessly aside onto the bed.

You barely even register what's hit you when he moves out from beneath you and shoves you down face-first into the bed, your legs hanging off of the edge. You're winded and dazed and the absence of the enormous pink dildo and its unbearable vibrations is almost strange, like your body is still reeling from its affects and can't quite acclimate to the lack of stimulation. Dirk seems intent on remedying that, though — you hear a hasty unbuckling of pants and feel his cock slide against you, hard and thick and hot. The lack of him inside of you is more tortuous than anything that dildo did to you.

You whine pitifully and push up against him, urging him to fuck you in disjointed sentences it'd take a miracle to comprehend, but it's like he's hellbent on doing _anything_ but the thing you want. Rather than finish you off, he ruts against you tantalizingly, holding your hips steady so you have no chance of giving yourself relief. You beg and you beg but he ignores you resolutely, waiting until you've safely backed away from your orgasm before he presses the head of his cock against your wanting entrance.

He pushes inside and you angle your hips up instinctively to take him deeper, his girth filling that void you so desperately needed to be filled. When he's pushed in to the hilt, all you can manage is a shaky sigh, your legs trembling and your cock throbbing against the sheets of the bed. While Dirk's dick has a distinctive lack of a vibration feature, he certainly tries to make up for it — as soon as he starts to move he sets into bruisingly hard thrusts, at first slow and deep but then faster and faster until he's brutally pounding into you, his fingers dug into your hips so hard you feel the skin scrape even under his blunt nails. Every rough snap of his hips draws a breathy moan from your throat, long past the point of being able to control your vocalizations; you're left completely at his mercy like a puppet he controls at his will. You squeeze your eyes shut and fist your hands in the sheets but it does little to temper you to the intensity.

Even after so long with him you've never quite gotten used to how _big_ he is. Even just the feeling of his pulse inside of you against your stretched walls feels hyperacute, leaves you breathless and overloaded even when he's _still_ , and when he thrusts he strips you of your senses and reduces you to complete incoherency, blind and deaf to everything but the sensation of _him_. You'd fuck him forever if you could.

But you can't fuck him forever, and eventually he pushes you towards your peak again. He mercilessly assails you as you shudder, reaches his hand around to take your cock into your fist and stroke you in a pace as hard and erratic as his thrusts, and when he pushes you over the edge and spills you onto the sheets it's all you can do to remember to breathe. He pauses inside of you as you come, your muscles spasming around his still very hard dick. As soon as he has you spent he's moving again, each brush against your prostate painful in the wake of your orgasm, but you hold out for the short time it takes for him to finish and fill you with his warm and uncomfortably sticky cum.

When he pulls out of you it's like all the exhaustion and physical soreness rushes to catch up with you at once. You're tired and drained and your body hurts all over, your ass in particular throbbing and sore in about all the ways an ass can be, but you feel much better than you've felt in a long time. There's something oddly pleasant about the ache in your body — closer to the satisfying exhaustion of exercise than the reality of having basically been totally beaten up in bed.

All you want to do is stretch out across your bed and give in to sleep; you don't even notice when Dirk quietly excuses himself to leave you as you are. You just swaddle yourself in your blankets and drift off to rest.


	18. Chapter 18

"Mom, _no_ ," you plead.

"Davey, I'm not going to hear it," your mother sternly reprimands you over the phone. Somehow you know you're not going to win this, but you'll be damned if you're not going to try.

"It's just weird. I can't. I'm sorry."

What was a routine mommy checkup call quickly devolved into a world of shit after you let slip that you'd decided to not break up with Dirk after all. Naturally, your mother's immediate response was to begin relentlessly hounding you about how she absolutely _must_ meet him. Your mother does not easily admit defeat.

"Well, _I_ think it's weird that you'd think him suitable enough to put his penis inside of your body but not to meet your own mother."

"Mom, there are tons of people whose penises I would put inside of my body and not introduce to you. I'm pretty sure that covers mostly everybody."

"Dave, if you don't bring him up for Christmas I am going to pick a random day and I will drive to your apartment and introduce _myself_ to him."

Oh, god. She means it, too. You release a frustrated groan, spinning your chair around as circular as this stupid fucking argument. "It's not just that I don't want you to meet him — Jade's going to be there this year, right?"

"Of course!" your mother exuberantly confirms. 

"Okay, there," you say, hoping that will put some finality on the matter. "I hope you can at least understand why _that_ would be weird."

... Nooope. Her voice is actually one of genuine confusion when she responds. "Aren't you and Jade still friends? Are things awkward between you?"

"What, no — I mean, we're cool — but she's still my ex, come on. It is completely a weird thing to introduce your boyfriend to your fucking ex." 

"I don't see why. Jade is practically family."

"She's family I put my penis in. It's weird."

"Jade is a wonderful girl, I'm sure she'll be perfectly understanding of the situation," your mother says, resolutely refusing to see any measure of sense.

"You just don't get it."

"You're right, I don't! And I have no intention to. So you're either going to bring that boy home or I'll be forced to take drastic measures."

All you can do is let your forehead fall gently onto the surface of your desk.

 

***

 

turntechGodhead [TG] began pestering tentacleTherapist [TT]

TG: hey  
TG: you have a minute   
TT: Hey.  
TT: Actually, I've been meaning to talk to you about something.   
TG: oh sure my thing can wait  
TG: shoot   
TT: I suppose I should just get this out of the way now instead of blindsiding you with it when I come down for Christmas.   
TG: shit are you pregnant  
TG: who is he ill kill him   
TT: Dave.   
TG: ok fine  
TG: youre totally bringing a boytoy though arent you   
TT: See, that's the thing.  
TT: My boyfriend is sort of not a boy, and is a woman?   
TG: wait  
TG: what  
TG: are you serious   
TT: Yes.   
TG: wait  
TG: shit  
TG: so youre like  
TG: a carpet muncher now   
TT: ... That's... not how I would put it, but yes.   
TG: whoa  
TG: how long have you known   
TT: Approximately forever?   
TG: god damn  
TG: how come you never told me  
TG: i confided in you my awkward homosexual awakening   
TT: That's not how I remember it.   
TG: oh come on   
TT: I remember discovering you'd somehow managed to accidentally bring your boyfriend home to my dorm room in one of your drunken benders, and I _certainly_ remember that weekend I spent having to clean your semen and vomit stains out of my couch, but not much _confiding_.   
TG: he wasnt my boyfriend   
TT: Of course not.  
TT: In any case, there was your whole homophobia thing.   
TG: haha what  
TG: im not a homophobe  
TG: dude i am a homo   
TT: Right.  
TT: You just spent our entire adolescence calling John a fag for fun.   
TG: you know i didnt mean that shit  
TG: seriously what DIDNT i say to john  
TG: it was just like an opportunistic thing  
TG: we had gay friends i never gave them a hard time about it  
TG: i was just being an asshole thats what kids do   
TT: That didn't make it any less difficult to hear.  
TT: I was always a bit afraid you'd turn on me if you knew, I suppose.   
TG: are you kiddin me  
TG: ive always loved the hell out of you   
TT: We're talking about the silly things we thought when we were teenagers, remember?   
TG: yeah and then the silly thing you were thinking that made you not tell me for the other 14 years we werent teenagers   
TT: I don't know.  
TT: You always seemed ashamed even of your own same sex attractions.   
TG: hahaha im not ashamed of it   
TT: I was the only person you even told about it, and _that_ wasn't even on purpose.   
TG: not true  
TG: meenah knew   
TT: Meenah doesn't count.   
TG: what how does she not count   
TT: People who are there in the bed with you don't count.   
TG: thats an entirely arbitrary disqualification  
TG: and besides i told john and aradia and jade before the whole  
TG: thing   
TT: And _when_ did you tell them?   
TG: uh   
TT: This year, right?  
TT: Only when you had to.   
TG: man i just didnt want to deal with the drama its not like i have some ted haggard bullshit going on  
TG: im not even full on gay, i wouldve been perfectly fine only being with girls so thats what i did  
TG: because it was easier not cause i have massive internalized homophobia or what the fuck ever  
TG: now that im with a guy ill just deal with it  
TG: i mean  
TG: im telling people now   
TT: Dave, your own mother found out from your _sex tape_.   
TG: have you told her yet  
TG: about you   
TT: ... Of course I've told her?  
TT: I just said I'm bringing my girlfriend to Christmas.  
TT: Mother has been insisting I bring her for years.   
TG: wait so youve been actually dating a chick a plurality of years and still didnt tell me   
TT: Yes.  
TT: We also sort of got married last July when the Marriage Equality Act passed?  
TT: So there's that.   
TG: what the fucking shit  
TG: hooooleeee ass licking shit  
TG: what did you throw a whole fucking secret wedding no daves allowed   
TT: We didn't have a ceremony.   
TG: yeah cause then i mightve found out  
TG: you enormous hypocrite   
TT: You're so self-absorbed.  
TT: Our decision to not waste thousands of dollars on a frivolous gala that neither of us needed to validate our relationship had nothing to do with you.   
TG: so what am i the only person who doesnt know  
TG: does john know   
TT: Yes.   
TG: wow  
TG: dont fucking tell me you told johns dad before me   
TT: He was the first person I ever told, actually.   
TG: what the fuck   
TT: You know, there's a reason I don't irrationally hate everything he does.  
TT: It's because he's a good person.   
TG: i cant believe this  
TG: im your brother  
TG: how could you tell HIM and not me   
TT: He's also my father, Dave.   
TG: no he fucking isnt   
TT: Yes, see, this brings me to the _other_ reason I never tell you about these things.   
TG: what   
TT: I'm not particularly eager to tell you about my romantic life in general, what with the way you get with Mother.   
TG: what way   
TT: You know very well what I'm talking about.   
TG: no really  
TG: tell me about my way sis   
TT: Well,  
TT: Do I have to worry about you treating her the way you treat Dad?   
TG: ok now youre calling him that just to piss me off   
TT: No, I'm asking you a question, which you're evading.   
TG: look that has nothing to do with mom   
TT: Oh, please.  
TT: You hate every single man who even speaks to her.   
TG: what  
TG: no i hate him because hes a condescending douche with a pole up his ass   
TT: Really?  
TT: When you got over torturing John for being his son, you started hating every one of his girlfriends as well.   
TG: come on you cant hold that one against me  
TG: all of johns girlfriends actually have been fucking crazy   
TT: Even so.   
TG: like i just tell him to go date a fucking pro dom instead of picking up psychopaths to compensate for his complete lack of a spine  
TG: but no  
TG: the kid cant get it up unless hes being emotionally tormented by some manipulative soul sucking bitch apparently   
TT: I wonder whose fault that is?   
TG: haha fuck you   
TT: And besides,  
TT: You're hardly one to talk.  
TT: Your darling first love was and is worse than every girlfriend John has ever had combined.   
TG: uh  
TG: jade??   
TT: ... No, Meenah.   
TG: hahaha what the fuck meenah wasnt my "first love"   
TT: How funny that you always seem to have such wildly different accounts of your relationships than I observe.   
TG: that was just a sex thing   
TT: Oh, please.  
TT: You were inseparable in college.   
TG: we had a lot of sex   
TT: And just about everything else.  
TT: You told me you wanted to marry her.   
TG: hahahahahahaha what  
TG: no i fucking didnt  
TG: when the fuck did i say that   
TT: You were drunk.   
TG: i mustve been really fucking drunk because that would easily be the stupidest fucking thing id ever said in my life  
TG: it was probably when i was going through my clingy virgin attachment phase i got over that in like a month   
TT: No, this was around when she'd graduated and just left Seattle.   
TG: oh  
TG: haha  
TG: oh man  
TG: i think i remember the night youre talking about now  
TG: shit  
TG: why the hell am i finding out i said something that fucking dumb a decade later  
TG: that should have been some intervention worthy material   
TT: I'd just sort of hoped you would forget about it in the morning.  
TT: Which you did.   
TG: yeah but what if it hadnt just been a product of my booze addled mind  
TG: what i actually thought it was a good idea   
TT: Then you would have told me about it again when you were sober, and I'd have had the opportunity to laugh myself to death without you being able to hide behind the excuse of inebriation.   
TG: gee thanks sis  
TG: ok so i was kind of bummed out when she left but that was like  
TG: i mean anybody would be it doesnt mean i was IN LOVE with her  
TG: who the fuck could love that bitch  
TG: i was like 19 and sad i wasnt getting laid anymore thats it   
TT: Sigh.  
TT: Whatever. Have however many delusions you like.  
TT: I honestly don't care!  
TT: I am utterly and completely done with your penis, Dave. There is nothing in this world I care about less than the places it's been and your reasons for putting it there or any of the emotions you have which stem from it.  
TT: Now, you said you had something you wanted to ask me?   
TG: well  
TG: its about my penis   
TT: I should have just gone to bed.   
TG: ok well its more like the situation i am now in thanks to the actions of my penis  
TG: but if you dont wanna hear about it its fine ill understand  
TG: ill just  
TG: tuck it between my legs and slink away   
TT: ... Just tell me.   
TG: ok  
TG: how do i  
TG: deal  
TG: with jade  
TG: shes gonna be there  
TG: but mom is insisting that i bring dirk   
TG: this is going to be so fucking awkward   
TT: What does it even matter?  
TT: You and Mother immediately hit the nog and are black out drunk within an hour of my arrival at the house.   
TG: god damn i did that once  
TG: and that was only because mom invited the fucking pool boy to christmas dinner and wouldnt stop staring at his ass  
TG: i needed to exit consciousness as fast as possible   
TT: I'm pretty sure he's going to be there again.   
TG: are you fucking kidding me  
TG: god damn doesnt that bastard have his own family   
TT: I don't think he does.   
TG: oh  
TG: well  
TG: fuck him and his sculpted glutes anyway   
TT: And you tell me you don't have a "way".   
TG: what  
TG: i dont  
TG: what   
TT: Whatever you say, dearest brother.  
TT: Anyway,  
TT: I really doubt it's going to be a big deal.   
TG: but what if jade gets upset or something   
TT: Do you even know Jade?   
TG: uhhhhhhh  
TG: yes rose  
TG: i know jade  
TG: biblically even  
TG: i dunno if you forgot or something but i sort of dated her for 10 fucking years   
TT: Were you perhaps blind, deaf and mute that entire time?  
TT: Because golly, all that time together didn't seem to teach you much of anything about the kind of person she is or how she feels about and reacts to things.   
TG: what   
TT: Dave...  
TT: Just talk to her about it if you're worried.  
TT: Crying to me about it certainly isn't going to help.   
TG: ugh  
TG: i just dont want to deal with any of this   
TT: Too bad.  
TT: You know better than anyone that there's no stopping our mother when she's put her mind to something.  
TT: It was hard enough for me to hold out as long as I did and I live on the opposite side of the country.  
TT: Just get it over with.   
TG: yeah  
TG: ok  
TG: ill talk to jade   
TT: Good.  
TT: I'll see you at Christmas.

tentacleTherapist [TT] ceased pestering turntechGodhead [TG]

With no lack of trepidation, you grab your phone and text Jade to get on Pesterchum the next chance she gets. Actually talking to her about this over the phone is a little more than you can handle at this point.

You spend a long time after staring expectantly at your Chumroll. You don't even know where Jade _is_ , exactly; you knew she'd been incommunicado for a while while she was shooting abroad, but Christmas is less than a week away and she must be back in town by this point. You think. You can't work up the nerve to actually _call_ her and see. You haven't even spoken to her since your sex tape leaked. Oh god, what if she brings it up???

It's almost two hours before she actually signs in — you don't know how long you would've sat there waiting if she weren't actually even in the fucking country yet. You'd normally try to play it cool, give it a few minutes and let her message you first, but you're so on edge you just go right ahead and contact her.

turntechGodhead [TG] began pestering gardenGnostic [GG]

TG: hey jade   
GG: hi!  
GG: whats up, did you need me for something?   
TG: youre still planning to come for christmas this year right   
GG: yup  
GG: why??   
TG: ok dont freak out but  
TG: mom is insisting that i bring the guy im seeing  
TG: so hes gonna be there   
GG: ok cool!   
TG: wait really   
GG: yeah?  
GG: dave  
GG: i dunno why you seem to think im going to be your nightmare ex o_O   
TG: ok i guess im basically like  
TG: projecting  
TG: since i am the nightmare ex  
TG: its me   
GG: dave its fine!  
GG: hehe im excited to meet him actually... :o   
TG: ok see this is weird  
TG: i cant even envision a circumstance in which i would have any positive emotion regarding meeting any of the people any of my exes are dating   
GG: rose showed me his websites   
TG: and that doesnt make you LESS eager to meet him   
GG: no i think theyre funny!  
GG: and if you like him he cant be all bad :)   
TG: no jesus hes awful  
TG: its gonna be terrible   
GG: but....  
GG: im confused  
GG: arent you dating him   
TG: god dammit jade why wont you just be as neurotic as i am   
GG: im sorry!!   
TG: no holy shit dont apologize  
TG: ok i need to go i have fucking rigatoni falling out of my pockets right now   
GG: what

turntechGodhead [TG] ceased pestering gardenGnostic [GG]

 

***

 

"You're not gonna like what I have to tell you," you solemnly announce as you stand at the threshold of Dirk's room.

Dirk is sat in his chair at his computer (it was a struggle to convince him to take your money to build one that wasn't shit, but he eventually conceded under the stipulation he would pay you back), headphones on with what looks like a puppet smut editing project in progress on his screen. He turns in his chair at the sound of your voice, an eyebrow raised behind his shades, and answers with an annoyed "what?" after setting his headphones aside.

You sigh deeply and pinch the bridge of your nose between your fingers. "My mother called me and told me that I either need to bring you home for Christmas or she's going to come up here on a random, unannounced date in the future to meet you herself."

"Okay," is all he answers.

You're actually surprised. You were expecting a whole ordeal of wheedling him and desperately trying to convince him not to escape to Mexico until she'd forgotten he'd even existed — his immediate assent was not anywhere in your playbook. Your mouth opens and closes in your speechlessness until you manage, "Really?"

Dirk shrugs. No indication of any strong feeling about it. "Sure. Why not?"

"I was expecting you to throw a fit about it."

"Why would I? Your mother seems like a nice lady." 

You furrow your brow. "You haven't even _met_ my mother."

"From what you've told me about her," he clarifies evenly.

"I don't think I've said a single word to you about her that wasn't egregiously over-exaggerated complaining about how awful she is."

"What, do you _want_ me to fight with you about it?" Dirk asks, a hint of exasperation creeping into his voice.

You immediately throw up your hands defensively. "No! I just — forget it," you sigh. "Okay, we'll just have to go up to Calabasas on Christmas Eve and probably stay there two days. Should I call my mom and tell her you're coming?"

"Yeah, go ahead."

 

***

 

When the day arrives, you quickly begin to wish you'd planned this better. You should have anticipated that Dirk's disgust for your extravagant lifestyle would come to a head when faced with the insurmountable opulence that is your mother's estate. The building is truly enormous, a mansion by any estimation, its sprawling gardens and grand fountains shamelessly pronouncing a degree of wealth that makes even you a bit uneasy when you try to see it through his eyes. You have no idea how he'll handle the actually having to go _inside_ that thing, forced to behold your mother's endless collection of massive, gaudy oil paintings of wizards she commissioned at thousands of dollars a canvas (not to even touch upon the cost of the frames) — you hope you can at least manage to conceal the existence of your stepfather's fucking _pipe room_. Why does a man need an entire room dedicated to pipes? Why does he have so many fucking pipes? You're getting mad thinking about the pipe room.

When you park your car in the lot and begin your trek up the garden path, you don't miss the gradually building revulsion on Dirk's face as the building looms closer. He seems to think better of actually commenting, though, so you do him the return courtesy of pretending you didn't notice.

"Please don't fuck this up," you grit out when the two of you come to stand before the large front door. The actual reality of ringing the bell is almost too much to handle. 

"Can you save the chastising for when I've _actually_ done anything wrong?" Dirk dryly replies, and then reaches past you to ring the doorbell itself.

Your eyeballs all but bug out of your skull. You were not fucking ready for that! You were going to need a good solid stretch of psyching up to actually be able to handle this fucking thing! You open your mouth to complain, but you silence yourself when you hear the frantically clicking heels of someone _incredibly_ excited to see you rushing to the door — all you can do is brace yourself.

"Daaaaaaaaavvveeyyyyyy!!" your mother exclaims after wrenching back the door, looking close to tears with joy. You freeze in embarrassment and can't manage more than a stiff ' _hi mom_ ' when your mother flings herself against you, her arms like a vice grip around your torso. She reeks of martini. "Oh, my sweet little baby, I'm missed you _so much!_ "

"Mom, I just saw you last week," you uncomfortably hiss. The mockingly amused grin that is working its way onto Dirk's face does not do much for the situation.

Your mother, of course, elects to ignore your complaints to coo in what is something dangerously close to baby talk, "I love you, honey poo."

Dirk snickers; it takes every fiber of your being to resist punching him in the throat when he mouths, " _Honey poo?_ "

Thankfully — or not so thankfully — you seem to be given a reprieve when your mother finally notices your guest. "And you must be Dick," she proclaims, withdrawing from you to regard him with her hands firmly set on her hips. _Oh my fucking god, why does this happen to you?_

Dirk looks to you with a raised brow before answering, "Dirk. Pleased to make your acquaintance, Ms. Lalonde."

It's like the world has turned into slow motion as you watch Dirk lean down to kiss the back of your mother's hand, as if he were some sort of fucking chivalrous gentleman. Your mother giggles flirtatiously and you've never longed for death more in your life.

"Oh, call me Roxy. I assure you, the pleasure is _all mine,_ " your mother purrs, her sultry tone a stark contrast to the way she perilously wobbles on her feet. Your mom is flirting with your boyfriend. She has known him for all of ten seconds and she is seriously putting the fucking moves on your boyfriend. You hate everything about existence.

" _Mom. Mom._ "

Your mother stops and looks to you, her hand still lingering in Dirk's. "What is it, dear?" she asks, attempting what you assume is supposed to be a coquettish smile. She doesn't quite have the motor control to manage it.

"Mom. Mom, you have to stop," you sternly command, reaching over to take your mother by her shoulders and relocate her a comfortable few paces away from your boyfriend.

Your mother just staggers along to where you direct her, looking at you in confusion. "Stop what?" she asks, affecting a hurt tone and wide, innocent eyes. She stumbles in her heels and you have to lurch to help her keep her balance. You are so utterly fucking done.

"Let's just go inside," you suggest in a strained voice, and your mother at least seems to agree that that's a good idea. With your hand firmly placed on her back, you steer your mother back into the house and close the door carefully behind you when Dirk has followed you inside.

"Want me to show you your room, Davey dear?" your mother enthusiastically asks once she's regained her bearings. "You'll be sharing one, right?"

"No, and yeah," you answer, eager to be rid of your mother as soon as possible. Sometimes you think it'd be a better idea to pick up on Rose's method of flying in and out on the same day. "I know where the rooms are, Mom, I've been here before."

"Fine, fine," she says, waving her hand dismissively. She apparently finds something else of interest to wobbily shuffle off on to, leaving you and Dirk alone in the entry parlor. You jump on the first opportunity to round on him angrily.

" _You're flirting with my mother,_ " you snap at him, hackles raised.

Dirk's response, of course, is to defiantly cross his arms with a flippantly raised brow. "And here I thought I was just being a gentleman to a beautiful lady."

It's all you can do to stop yourself from gagging vigorously. "She obviously wants to bang you, so will you just _stop?_ I can't deal with this. I absolutely cannot deal with whatever this fucking thing that is going on here is."

"I'm not going to have sex with your fucking mom, Dave," Dirk sighs, his hands moving to his hips in his exasperated _I am so sick of your antics, son_ dad expression he does that creeps you the fuck out.

" _She may not give you a choice._ "

Not even Dirk seems to have a response to that. He just gives you this long, incredulous look before eventually saying, "Will you just show me the fucking room?"

You turn on your heel and stomp moodily through the house, Dirk trailing not far behind you. You navigate up the flight of stairs to the guest wing — Dirk is eager to comment on how fucking ridiculous it is to have a _guest wing_ — and push open the door to your designated room. It's technically a supposed to be a guest bedroom, given its location, but nobody ever uses it but you; your mother and stepfather appropriated the other bedrooms in the estate for their respective stupid fucking hobbies and the ludicrous collections they incur.

Inside is the room exactly as you'd left it last year, plus a bit of a dust coating (for once you're relieved your mother doesn't actually employ any maids; you're not sure Dirk wouldn't start spinning and blast off into fucking space if faced with that). You flick on the light switch and toss your bag on the bed, Dirk following suit.

Of course, the first fucking thing Dirk does is try to mack on you. You reflexively shove him off and hastily wipe your mouth on the back of your sleeve, protesting loudly, "Dude, I'm not gonna — _in my fucking mom's house!_ "

"Why not?" Dirk asks, deliberately obtuse.

"Because — fuck off, I'm not doing this," you grumble, definitively ending that line of conversation by turning and making a beeline for the closet.

Despite presumably having every intention of pushing the matter, Dirk's curiosity seems to win out over his libido. He watches you in mild interest, which builds when you suddenly drop onto your knees to crawl _into_ the closet. "... What the fuck are you doing?" he asks, wandering up behind you to look after you.

"Lookin' for my cat," you casually remark, crawling beneath the old hanging coats towards the small bundle of fur nestled into the darkest corner of the closet. You wouldn't know it was there unless you were looking for it.

As your eyes adjust to the dim light, you get a better look at him — his coat of fur is scraggly yet very thin, and it appears as if every part of the cat is drooping. His ears, his eyes, his skin — the poor thing is clearly on its last legs, and the sight of him makes you very sad. You figure this will probably be the last time you ever see him.

Your cat, however, seems to have no knowledge of his own mortality; as soon as he notices your presence, he pulls himself up to his feet. The old cat moves with a gait that can only be described as shambling; he looses a particularly loud _meow_ as he makes his way over towards you, evidently as fast as his elderly little legs will take him. As soon as he reaches you he starts to purr, bumping his head up against you — you scoop him up into arms, push back out of the closet and stand, stroking along his back as you cradle his frail body.

"That cat is fucking ancient," Dirk remarks, warily regarding the animal.

"He's like nineteen or twenty years old," you say. "My mom got him for me as an apology for marrying my stepfather."

Dirk doesn't seem to know what to say. You don't know if he hates cats or just thinks yours is particularly ugly. He eventually settles on asking, "What's his name?"

You don't imagine he actually cares what your cat's name is, but you answer anyway. "Tupac."

"... Really, dude?"

"Really," you defensively echo, drawing your cat closer to your chest. He weakly _meows_. "Don't shittalk Tupac, he's the best cat in the world."

"There are so many fucking cats in this house," Dirk grumbles. "I saw like fucking three of them lurking around the fucking entryway and everything is covered in cat hair. How many of these goddamn rats does your mother even own?"

You actually have to stop to think, your eyes drifting up to the ceiling. "Umm. There's Merlin — the third — Gandalf, Dumbledore — Dumbledore and Gandalf are the girl cats — uhhh. Kernberg is the other old ass cat, he used to be Rose's but Mom couldn't part with him so he stays here. Then there are Frigglish and Zazzerpan and Calmasis. Oh, Merlin is the orange tabby, Gandalf is a calico for some reason, Dumbledore is the big shaggy grey cat, Kernberg is the old little black one. Frigglish is black too but bigger and has a white spot on his tail and never shuts the fuck up. And Zazzerpan is a persian or something, the one that looks like he got kicked in the face. Calmasis is the tiny white cat, but he never comes out when people are over so you probably won't see him."

" _Eight cats,_ " he says in disbelief. "Fucking eight cats."

"She's had more. One of them died just last year. I think the most cats she ever had at one time was thirteen when she adopted practically an entire fucking shelter of them right after I bought her this house."

"Your mother is fucking insane."

"Tell me about it," you sigh.

You're not given much time to settle in before you hear the doorbell ring again; your cat wriggles out of your arms and escapes back into the closet at the sound. "That's probably John," you say — you _hope_ it's John, at least, because you'd sure as hell like to put off meeting Jade again for as long as possible. "He's bringing another crazy fucking girlfriend home again this year."

"She a bitch?" Dirk absently asks.

"Haven't met her."

"Then how do you know she's crazy?"

"John is dating her," you simply say, and take your leave from the bedroom to go back downstairs. 

You hurry down the steps to the entry foyer, Dirk trailing behind you without quite as much enthusiasm. At the door stands your mother, stepfather and the two latest guests of the home — John, and what you presume to be his girlfriend.

This broad is... something else. The first thing that honestly runs through your mind is _holy shit, did he bring home a meth addict?_ Stood next to John is a rather tall and perhaps the boniest woman you've ever seen, her skin almost as sheet-white as the bedraggled excuse for a dress that only _barely_ covers her non-existent ass. Her face seems frozen in an unsettlingly intense rictus, framed by an unruly mass of waist-length dark hair that you can only assume has never been brushed. Her ostentatious blue makeup lends her the appearance of a drag queen or a particularly fashion unconscientious hooker, awkwardly offset by the large and thick glasses that consume most of her face.

What a fucking piece of work. It's not like you wouldn't hit that, because you would — but _Jesus, John._ You can practically smell the baggage wafting off of her. It seems like your stepbrother's latest squeeze is going to be no exception to his bewildering propensity for hooking up with women who are _absolutely fucking batshit insane_.

From his expression, your stepfather seems to have reached a similar conclusion; he stands by awkwardly as his wife chats amiably with his son, his face contorted into some sort of constipated grimace as he struggles to look anywhere but at the new girlfriend's pasty white thighs. Suddenly, you feel a bit more inclined to like her.

You reach the gathering and offer a casual greeting. "Yo. This your new lady friend, Egbert?" you say, your eyes sweeping up and down said lady friend once more. You notice the obnoxiously red pumps she's wearing from this vantage.

"Uh, yeah," John says, looking between you and his girlfriend awkwardly. "This is Vri—"

"I can introduce _myself,_ John," she says, boldly offering her hand for you to shake. "I'm Vriska Serket."

You pause for a moment before returning her proffered shake — she has cold and clammy hands, and a crushingly tight grip that you weren't quite expecting. You try to catch your wince, but from the quirk at the corner of her thin painted lips, you think she saw it — she stares you down over her sharp beak of a nose with a predator's eyes, clear and alarmingly blue with pinprick pupils that unsettle you to gaze into. You feel oddly shamed by the small and bizarre challenge, your own eyes unfairly obscured by the opaque bulwarks of your shades; she seems to penetrate your defenses all the same, leaving you feeling exposed and vulnerable with all of a look.

You realize your hand is still clasped in hers after several awkward moments into your standoff, and you're quick to wrench it back as soon as you've returned to your senses. "I'm Dave, John's brother," you eventually say, brow furrowed. What the fuck even just _happened_ there?

The rest of the group seems to have been infected by the same discomfort as you, the room descending into a strange silence — the only one who seems unperturbed is Vriska, unrelenting in her intensely piercing stare. You are gonna freak the fuck out. Your mother looks between the rest of you in confusion before eventually attempting to do something to remedy the unease, and speaks up with a gesture to Dirk, "Oh, John, have you met Dirk?"

You look back over your shoulder to Dirk, stood like a statue a few paces behind you. All eyes turn to him, and he stiffens even further under the scrutiny. John opens and closes his mouth a few times before raising a timid hand. "Uh. Hi, I'm John," he says, giving a small wave that he's quick to withdraw when Dirk answers him with a blank stare.

This is _so fucking awkward._

"John, Vriska, why don't I show you to your rooms," your mother offers, forcing a strained smile onto her face. John seems grateful for the opportunity to extract himself from the situation and nods enthusiastically, moving to quickly follow after your mother with Vriska short behind.

With their departure, you and Dirk are left alone with your stepfather, who seems to become even more unsettled when he becomes aware of that fact. He doesn't dally long — he spends a short uncomfortable moment looking between you before he gives a slight tip of his hat, mumbles something unintelligible and takes his leave from the entry parlor with long, hasty strides.

You look at Dirk. Dirk looks at you.

Oh god, this is going to be the most mortifying experience of your fucking life. Jade isn't even here yet and you're going to fucking kill yourself from shame. Holy shit, how the fuck are you even going to _dea_ —

The doorbell rings again. You stomach plummets.

There are basically only two people it could be. Rose never arrives until Christmas day, and the pool boy only comes around for dinner — so of the people who you know are coming, all that's left is Jade and Eridan. You move back to the door with all the hope in your heart you can muster.

 _please be eridan please be eridan please be eridan please be eridan_ —

You open the door.

It's not Eridan.

"Jade," you breathe, all of your trepidation and anxiety reaching a head as you stare at her stood across the threshold.

You hear the clatter of your mother's heels running to return the door once more, but they abruptly stop — you can only assume that she decided it best to leave you alone for a little while longer when she realized who the guest was.

"Dave, it's so good to see you!" Jade exclaims, stepping forward through the door to pull you into a warm hug. You're taken a little off guard, but embrace her when you've recovered your bearings — you can't help but twist your head to look over to Dirk and assess his level of Jealous Anger. Him having it out for Jade is the last fucking thing you need. Thankfully, he doesn't seem to be inclined to do much other than stand there quietly with a blank look on his face.

When the two of you pull apart, the smile Jade gives you is no less warm and fond than it always is. You smile back, unsure of what to say or do or where to go from here; Jade supplies that for you when she notices the tall figure lurking back over your shoulder, and steps over to the side to get a better look at him. "Hi!" she says, offering Dirk a brisk and amiable wave. "You're Dave's boyfriend, right?"

You turn to look to Dirk expectantly, _don't fuck this up_ etched plainly across your face. He gives a little upward twitch of his head that you know means he just fucking rolled his eyes, but he thankfully manages to restrain himself from saying or doing anything atrocious. All he does is give a small shrug of his shoulder and answer, "I guess."

"I'm very glad to meet you! I'm Dave's friend, Jade." She steps further into the parlor, evidently intent on engaging Dirk in direct conversation. You can already see him bristling. This isn't going to end well.

"You're his ex-girlfriend," he tersely replies, like it's a correction.

Jade doesn't seem to know how to respond at first; she appears momentarily disarmed by the passive-aggressive hostility emanating from Dirk, her chipper smile faltering and turning strained. Intent on keeping relations cordial, though, she bounces right back and words her reply as friendly as possible. "Well, yeah. I guess so! But being his friend is more important than that, I think!"

Dirk looks to be sizing Jade up, from the way his gaze sweeps up and down her body. You've got no fucking idea what's going through his head. Does he intend to start a fucking brawl with Jade? You give him a warning glare and he backs down, but his tone is no less frosty and dismissive than before. "Whatever you say," he drawls, shoving his hands into his pockets as he enters a resolute silence.

Another awkward specter descends as you look from Jade to Dirk and back, and they look to you and each other and back again, and all of you are either unable or unwilling to find anything to say. The discomfort builds and builds until, in a miraculous inversion, your mother descends upon your group in a very welcome fashion.

Your mother immediately engages Jade in spirited chatter, leaving you and Dirk thankfully excused. You decide it's time to take your leave again when your stepfather reappears, so you take Dirk by the wrist and drag him back to the safety and seclusion of your bedroom.

"You were being a bitch," you chastise him after closing the door behind you, to which he answers with defiantly crossed arms and an expression that patently broadcasts that he absolutely does not give a shit about what you think about how he's being.

"You're mine," he stubbornly defends himself, as if that were a fucking justification.

You slowly drag your palm down your face. You know there's no point in attempting to contest the statement, given that he apparently has the mentality of an eight year old boy, so you try another tactic. "And not treating Jade like shit isn't going to change that. Come on, dude."

"You dated her for ten years."

"So what? We broke up two years before I even _met_ you."

"You don't date somebody for ten years and just _get over it_ , you fuckin' dullard."

You cannot even comprehend his level of paranoid obtusity. You do not even know how to engage with him or explain it when he clearly already has his mind dead fucking set on believing some irrelevant crock of bullshit, but you make what you're sure is a futile attempt. "The fuck does that even matter? Obviously I still fucking like Jade, but we broke up for a reason," you say, heat rising in your face. God, it's like he has some sort of preternatural affinity for making you angry and frustrated. Nobody else can get you this worked up that fast. "I'm not going to just drop you and go back to her on a fucking whim, and she's not going to fucking try to steal me away from you, and even if either of those things had even the smallest of fucking probabilities of happening, being a cunt about it certainly wouldn't fucking help. Chill out."

"You can't _make_ me like her," he petulantly protests. Holy shit, sometimes you can't even comprehend how this guy is real.

"You don't have to like her, you just have to be civil and not an awful little shit to her."

Your argument is interrupted when yet another ring of the doorbell resounds through the house. You sigh, but Dirk seems eager to use it as a way to escape the argument. "We gonna go down and see whoever the fuck that is again?" he asks.

"No, it's probably just Eridan," you say, wandering across the length of the bedroom to collapse onto the soft bed. You reposition your head just in time to see Dirk raise his eyebrow above his shades.

"Your manager comes to your house for Christmas?"

"Me and that little shit go way back," you yawn, stretching out across the bed before rolling onto your back. "He used to be my agent when I was just starting out and I kinda got him disowned by his dad so he gets a pity spot at the table or whatever. Plus my mom loves him."

"The fuck did you manage that?"

You wave your hand dismissively. "Long story. Basically his dad owned the agency and wanted me to give him a blowie, but I wouldn't. Eridan wouldn't help blackmail me and got tossed on his ass, the end."

"That's... weird."

"Yeah," you confirm, before settling back into a quiet rest on the bed. Being around your family tires you the fuck out. All you want to do is just kind of vegetate until Christmas day.

Dirk, however, doesn't seem to be so content doing nothing. He stands there looking at you expectantly for a time, and when he finally realizes you don't actually intend to _move_ or do anything, he says with mild irritation, "... Well, it's not like there's anything to fucking _do_ up here."

With a groan, you push yourself back up to sit. "What, do you actually _want_ to see that dude?" you ask. The topic reminds you of another layer of awkward garbage you hadn't even considered. "Oh god, he's going to be pissed you're here."

"Why?" Dirk asks, furrowing his brow. "The hell did I do to him?"

"Remember how I gave you his number and you kept calling him relentlessly to ask me to read your script, even after he blocked your number?"

"... Oh, yeah."

"Well, that's not why. He hates you because you called him on a Sunday, and he dedicates every Sunday of his week to watching all of the Shrek movies back to back. You interrupted his sacred ritual," you say sharply, in hopes of emphasizing how very much he does not want to have anything to do with that kid.

There's a long moment of silence as Dirk's brain struggles to digest that bizarre fact. In the end, all he can manage to say is, "What the fuck?"

" _Yeah._ "

There's not much left to do in the day other than watch Dirk like a hawk to ensure he doesn't do anything to utterly mortify you. You follow him around like you're joined at the hip, show him around the estate when he expresses his boredom enough times that you feel like you need to do something to get him to shut up, and glower at him moodily for the great majority of the time. Predictably, Eridan has a mini-meltdown after inevitably running into Dirk, but you're afforded a bit of a distraction when your mother informs you that a cat has shit in the potato bag. 

Your mother sends you to the store and you take Dirk with you, just because you don't trust him to be left alone with your family. You don't trust him to come into the store with you either, so you leave him to stew angrily in the car as you run inside and grab a bunch of potatoes. When you return to the car, Dirk spitefully informs you that he distinctly remembered your mother asking for red skin potatoes, and you argue with him for five minutes about it until you give up and go trudge back through the fucking parking lot and buy red skin potatoes. You don't even see why it matters. 

It's thankfully close to a reasonable bedtime when you return back with your purchase — you bring both kinds of potatoes you bought, and only barely restrain yourself from punching Dirk in the balls in response to the smug fucking look he gets on his stupid face when your mother confirms that she had indeed asked for red skin potatoes — and you take Dirk with you to sequester yourselves in your room for the rest of the night.

"Bedtime", of course, is about three hours before you actually fall asleep, so to entertain yourself you set up your laptop and browse through shitty websites.

"You know, if you want to kill some time, we could just fuck," Dirk suggests, sat propped up by the headboard next to you with his arms folded across his chest. You decline to look back at what is undoubtedly the shit-eating little smirk on his face.

"You could also just fuck off," you absently reply, clicking through an imageboard thread about anal vore. 

"My dick has to be a hell of a lot more entertaining than whatever that bullshit there is."

"I really don't think it is."

Dirk decides the appropriate course of action is to reach over and close your laptop. You turn your head to look over your shoulder and glare at him, but that quickly reveals itself to have been a bad decision; he leans in and kisses your lips, and when you reflexively lurch away and move to escape the vicinity of the bed, he grabs you around the waist to pull you back down onto the mattress. You groan in exasperation and push his face away from yours with your hand — it's an uphill battle you're beginning to realize you are likely going to lose, but in a stroke of divine intervention, the raucous noise that erupts from the adjacent bedroom stops the both of you in your tracks.

"YES, JOHN! OHHHHHHHH, JOHN, FUCK ME HARDER! YES, YES, YES, OH GOD YES, FUCK ME WITH YOUR HUGE COCK, AAHHHHHHHH!!!!!!!!"

"... All right, not even I can keep it up listening to that," Dirk sighs.

Well, at least you've finally found common ground on something.


	19. Chapter 19

You awake the next morning to a combination of excitement and utmost dread.

On one hand, you generally enjoy the chance to get together with your family. However exhausting your mother is, you'd be a straight up liar if you said you disliked her company, and you see John and Rose and Jade so infrequently these days that the four of you make a concerted effort to make the time you have together a blast. On the other, you have the perpetual inconvenience of the unavoidable presence of your less-than-beloved stepfather, and on top of that, your paranoid fears surrounding Jade and Dirk and everything that he could do to destroy this for everyone.

You do your best to be optimistic, though. If Dirk keeps his fucking mouth shut, it won't be that bad. You're very eager to meet Rose's girlfriend — or wife, as it were — and you're always delighted to find new and exciting ways to shit on John's girlfriends.

Dirk is already awake by the time you pull your lazy ass out of your coma, and it's a surprise to find him actually next to you while he's conscious. Still hopelessly groggy, you roll onto your side where you can get a look at him; he's sat beside you propped up against the headboard, reading a thick tome of what you can only guess from your glimpse of the cover is more of that mind-numbing Greek philosophy shit he's steadily filled your bookshelves with since he moved in. You're stricken by a compulsion to give him a wedgie and shove him inside of a locker.

He has his shades on even now, but you don't have to see behind them to know he keeps his eyes carefully trained on his book as he speaks. "Good morning," he simply acknowledges you, pointedly turning a page.

"Hey," you say, taking a moment to yawn and rub your eyes. "You know what time it is?"

"Nearly noon," he answers. He's clearly not reading his book at this point, but he refuses to look away from it all the same. "Didn't wanna go out there by myself so I've just been reading here."

"All right." You throw back the sheets covering your legs and push off the bed onto your feet, stretching lazily. "I'm gonna go take a quick shower and get dressed. My sister should be showing up some time after lunch, and then we do the present opening thing."

Dirk snorts. "You have a 'present opening thing'?"

"Yeah. We mostly just give each other shitty joke gifts. I'm sure whatever Rose got you will be —"

"You never told me I'd be involved in that shit," Dirk immediately complains, visibly recoiling in horror. You turn to see he's dropped his book into his lap.

"Chill out, it won't be anything expensive. Probably. Actually, my mom will probably give you something expensive but the rest of them will all just be digs at me. Most likely."

That didn't seem to have been any reassurance to him. " _I don't want any presents,_ " he vigorously protests. "I don't want anything from anybody. I wouldn't have come if I'd known th—"

" _Fine,_ " you snap. Your temper has been running awfully short with him lately. "Fine, no fucking fun allowed. I'll tell my fucking family to cater to your ridiculous idiot fucking neuroses and not give you anything. Will that make you happy, you soul-sucking son of a bitch?"

Dirk seems almost taken aback by your outburst. "Jesus Christ, who shit in your bloody vagina?" he responds, a sneer pulling at his lip.

Of course, he always has a flippant dismissal to answer with! You don't have a legitimate reason to be sick of his shit, you're a _hysterical menstruating woman_. You elect to disengage entirely and stomp to the bathroom for a cathartic shower — and it's certainly not the first time you have a rage wank, but it's probably your angriest. You feel a lot better when you've cleaned up and blown off a little steam.

When you emerge from the bathroom with a towel around your waist, you find Dirk still warily sat on the bed, watching you with a high guard. He seems reluctant to say anything, instead opting to wait for you to give some sort of indication of your mood — and to his apparent relief, you elect to act like nothing had happened at all.

"Once I'm dressed I'm going to go down to the parlor and camp there until my sister shows up," you note as you head to the closet and dig out something to wear. You're too lazy to bother packing anything other than underwear, so you usually leave a few sets of clothes at your mother's house to accommodate your own laziness. You just pick a simple pair of old worn jeans and a red shirt, and once you've pulled them on, you turn to extend Dirk the formal olive branch. "Wanna come with me?"

Dirk gives a small shrug of his shoulder to emphasize how little he cares, of course, before succinctly answering, "Sure."

You lead him back down the stairs once you're set, stopping by the kitchen to check up on your mother. You'd missed the little lunch she'd made, and she loudly laments your sleeping schedule despite the fact hers is identical to yours 364 days of the year. You wave her off and grab a cookie out of the jar on the counter to serve as a breakfast substitute.

Dinner is already in progress, and she and your stepfather seem to have drafted John into assisting with the preparation. You commend your mother on her fine work — even though your stepfather honestly does 90% of it, while she simply stands about making ludicrous suggestions for ways he can "spice things up" that invariably go unheeded — before you slip away to set up your waiting spot in the small entry parlor.

You sit about in one of the plush chairs, throwing an expectant glance at the clock on the wall every so often. Neither you nor Dirk seem to have much to say to each other — you from your anxiety, and him from his natural reticence. It's not until you hear the faint sounds of a vehicle pulling up to the lot of the estate do you jump to your feet and rush to the window to assess the identity of the latest guests.

"My sister is bringing home her girlfriend today," you confide in a low voice when Dirk comes to stand behind you, gazing out the window in a curiosity a fair bit more tempered than yours.

"Ha, I knew she was a muncher," he remarks. You doubt it.

" _I_ didn't even know she was a muncher," you grumble.

Dirk lets out a quiet laugh. "What, was she in the closet until just now?"

"No, just to me," you complain, peering out the window as a pair of figures step out of their car. The lot is so far from the building you can't actually see anything about who they are, though that certainly seems like Rose's taste in rentals. "She didn't want to tell me because I used to call my stepbrother a fag when I was in high school or something. Fucking _everybody else_ knew. Fuck, she's not even bringing home her girlfriend, they're _married_. She got _married_ and she didn't tell me, holy shit! Can you even _believe_ that shit?"

"Yeah," he answers. "Being a fag is hard, if you haven't noticed."

"Dude, I _am_ a fag. I don't even get it."

"You're only a half-fag, and a fuckin' pathetic closet case at that. I wouldn't have told you either."

"Thanks for the vote of confidence," you dryly reply as you press your face against the glass. As they start up the garden path, you can definitely see that that's Rose, and you don't know who else the tall woman beside her could be other than her _wife_. You are having quite a bit of difficulty mentally quantifying your emotions regarding this entire situation, namely because whatever they are feel so strangely close to jealousy. You are _not_ fucking jealous your sister has a wife — you have enough fucking awkward incestuous issues without _that_ on top of it all.

You move away from the window when your sister draws close enough that she might notice your presence at the window, and reoccupy your anxious seat in the parlor. Dirk follows after you with a questioning expression, and you moodily answer him without him needing to say anything. "I'm sitting here so it'll look like it took me some time to get to the door and answer it and that I'm not just _standing_ there waiting for her."

"Uh... okay, dude."

As soon as you hear that doorbell ring, though, you are on your feet in an instant. You can already hear your mother hurrying from elsewhere in the house, and you have a duty to beat her to the punch. You're going to have the first look at this broad if it kills you.

You practically run to the front door and only barely resist the urge to rip it off its hinges. Instead, you restrain yourself, undo the locks, and then pull it back to behold the spectacle.

_Holy shit._

Next to your dear sister stands what is potentially one of the hottest fucking women you have ever seen. Her black hair is short but feminine and clearly arranged by the hand of an expert stylist; it frames a face that is at once delicate and sculpted, with long dark lashes, full lips and immaculately groomed eyebrows. The subtle green of her eyeshadow brings out the much more intense color of her eyes, which stand as a bright contrast to her warm complexion — you assume she's some kind of Arab? You're so fucking white and suburban you couldn't say. She's dressed in a vibrant red dress with shimmering patterns woven into its luxurious cloth; your eyes trail down the apparently infinite expanse of her legs to her black designer heels, which you'd eyeball at at least a two thousand dollar retail price. You contemplate complaining to your mother later about how disturbed you are you can price women's shoes with a look.

You only realize you're gawking when your sister very pointedly clears her throat. 

"It's very nice to see you again, dear brother," Rose tightly says, a warning intensity to her narrowed eyes.

You snap yourself out of your stupor and look to your sister, managing up an inarticulate, "Oh, uh, yeah." Poor Rose looks like a grey little ice princess, her pallor particularly deathly next to her radiant guest — and her stark white and black blouse and skirt ensemble certainly aren't doing anything to help. You're a hair's breadth away from utterly emasculating yourself with a wardrobe coordination suggestion when you're thankfully interrupted by your mother's arrival.

You hear her before you see her, a ear-splittingly shrill screech emanating from the ungodly chamber of her lungs. Your mother barrels past you at a speed far quicker than her short little beheeled strides should allow, and she accosts her daughter with a hug so tight that you think you see Rose's face turning purple. "Roooossssiiieeeee!!!! Oh Rosie I missed you _so_ much, it's been _forever_ since we last saw each other, _oh_ it's so good to finally be all together again as a family my sweet little darling angel I love you _so so much_ —"

"Mom," you tersely interrupt, attempting to rescue your sister with a hand on your mother's shoulder. "Mom, you're choking her to death."

"Oh!" your mother exclaims, releasing Rose at once, to her daughter's immense relief. To her subsequent horror, though, your mother immediately turns to address the tall — and at this point rather perturbed — woman at Rose's side. "And you must be Kanaya! Rosie has told me absolutely nothing about you!" she says, the exuberant tone of her voice coupled with her bright smile nearly entirely disguising that passive aggressive jab at Rose's expense. Your sister, of course, doesn't fail to catch it, and rolls her eyes so far up into her skull they might stick there.

"Er, yes," Kanaya answers, awkwardly clasping her hands in front of herself. "I'm Kanaya Maryam, Rose's... Rose's wife. I'm very glad to meet you, Ms. Lalonde." She has a very clear voice and an almost stilted articulacy to the way she speaks. You can't tell if that's how she normally is, or if she's just trying way too hard.

"Please! I may not know you at _all_ —" Rose grits her teeth. "— but I can't have my _daughter-in-law_ calling me _miz_. Why don't we start with Roxy and move up to Mom later, hm?" your mother suggests. You're pretty sure Rose is about a hair's breadth away from strangling the woman.

"Um, all right, then. Um, Roxy," Kanaya says, grinning an incredibly awkward smile. You feel bad for the poor girl.

"Should probably get back inside," you suggest in a feeble attempt of sparing Kanaya a bit of humiliation, but you know it'll be a long, long night for her either way.

Even after herding the group back into the house, your mother seems no more deterred from making Rose's life miserable. "Rosie, you look so pale! Are you sick?" she asks, instantly triggering a look of utmost exasperation to pass over your sister's face.

"No, Mother, my skin is white because I am Caucasian."

"So am I, but _I_ don't look like I need to go to the hospital," your mother cattily replies. Indeed, your mother has acquired quite the healthy California tan since her relocation to Calabasas; when you'd lived in New York and Washington, though, she wasn't much better off than Rose. You think she's just bragging.

Rose looks to be about five seconds from starting a full-blown catfight. "I am an author, Mother. I don't have the luxury of spending all of my time trouncing about on the beach in the flimsiest swimwear money can buy, shoving my coriaceous posterior in the faces of every man, woman and child I can find. I have to sit in my room and _write._ "

Your mother either entirely misses the scathing tone of Rose's reply, or just does not give a fuck, because she simply waves Rose with a dismissive flap of her hand. "Yes, dear. Anyway, now that you're here, I do believe it's time for us to open our presents!"

Dirk gives you a pointed look, and you use the opportunity afforded to you when Jade, John, John's Girlfriend, Eridan and your stepfather appear from elsewhere in the house to join in on Rose's welcoming committee to take your mother aside.

"Hey," you address her in a hushed tone. She seems confused but supremely curious. "Before we do the presents thing, if you or anybody got anything for Dirk, could you... not? He has issues about that kind of shit. He'll probably flip out if he gets anything."

Your mother, surprisingly, seems to instantly understand. Usually, she's more pushy about her extravagant shows of generosity. "Oh, of course. I'm sorry, dear, I hadn't thought about that. I'll take care of everything."

"It's my fault, I should've known he'd blow a fucking gasket over it and told everybody to hold off from the beginning," you sigh, rubbing your forehead. Dirk is watching you intently from across the room; you're trying to keep your voice down, but knowing him, he can probably read your lips anyway.

"Don't worry about it!" she assures you, tipping up onto her toes to spontaneously plant a kiss on your cheek. She practically slobbers all over you and you have to resist the urge to shudder and frantically rub it off until she's gone. "I'll fix it up. Just head over to the living room and I'll bring everyone else down once Rosie's settled it, all right?"

You give her your assent (and wipe off your cheek as soon as she's departed), then wander back over to Dirk to reassure him that he will not have to suffer any displays of good will and/or poor taste. 

Dirk at least seems to be pacified by that. As the rest of the party ushers your sister upstairs to her room, chatting noisily all the while, you motion for Dirk to follow you and lead him through the halls of the house to the main living area. 

Said living area, of course, is no less evidence for your egregious familial opulence than the grand estate's extravagant facade. Everything about the room broadcasts excess; the enormous chandelier that hangs from the high ceiling, the expensive and intricately patterned window curtains, the real-and-conspicuously-roaring fireplace — every goddamn thing around you is practically screaming _rich white people_ and leaves you spectacularly self-conscious. You awkwardly direct Dirk to take a seat on one of the many multi-thousand-dollar upholstered seats arranged around the ludicrously tall and overdecorated Christmas tree erected in the center of the room.

"Uh, sorry," you mumble as you sit beside him, your hands fidgeting in your lap.

"The fuck are you apologizing for?" Dirk asks, looking to you with a raised brow.

"It's — nothing, forget it."

Dirk, thankfully, appears to be willing to do so, and the two of you fall into a silence that is more than a little restless on your part. You look to the ridiculous, gigantic hand-carved grandfather clock against the wall and anxiously check the time; you don't know why you bothered, since it's not like your mother will be arriving on a timed schedule.

A few painfully long minutes tick by before you hear the sound of your mother's heels approaching, soon followed after by the rest of the footfalls of your now numerous array of guests. Your mother blusters into the living room with a bright face, looking to you joyously like she hadn't _just_ fucking seen you two seconds ago."It's tiiiiiime!!" she declares; on cue, your family and their guests filter into the room, taking their own seats around the tree. Jade chooses hers next to you on the couch, and receives a frosty look from Dirk you certainly hope she didn't catch. You shoot him one of your own and he thankfully seems to back down.

"Oh, wait, just a moment," your mother interjects once the party has properly settled; you watch her with an acute sense of embarrassment as she gingerly steps through the mountain of presents clustered around the tree to pick out a number of oversized packages. Everyone looks on in confusion as she conspicuously trundles out of the room, and, once out of sight, drops the load onto the floor of the hallway with a resounding _thud_ — you grit your teeth and rub your temples and of _course_ everyone is looking at you because you're clearly the only fucking one who has any idea what that was about. All but Dirk, who retains his composure and tactfully looks anywhere but at you or your mother.

She's quick to return once again, this time rubbing her hands together in excitement. "Okay, who wants to go first?"

Eager to divert attention away from yourself, you pipe up immediately. "I'll hand out one of mine," you offer, and your mother beams gleefully at your initiative.

"All right! Let's get this party started!"

After steadily rising to your feet, you cross the room to search through the pile of presents for the particular one you're looking for. You find it near the foot of the tree; it's of modest size, with blue wrapping paper and a silver bow (you had Aradia wrap all of your presents for you — you stopped even trying a long, long time ago). You double check the tag and then briskly turn to face your target with a subtly predatory smirk, who is notably confused as you approach her.

"For me?" Vriska asks as she hesitantly takes the proffered package. She, too, checks the tag, and upon verifying that her name is indeed written on it, looks to John sat next to her — who is, of course, already flushed with the anticipatory bright crimson of embarrassment. He knows something is coming and it's never, ever good.

"Uh, yeah," John slowly explains. "It's — we always have gifts for the guests. I mean, sort of, don't expect —"

Vriska elects to ignore John in favor of tearing into the wrapping paper enthusiastically. You return to your seat as she does, your grin steadily broadening all the while — at least until your mother also squeezes in between you and Dirk and flashes your brother a flirty look that makes you want to strangle the both of them, especially so when his only reaction is a coy smirk that you _know_ is only going to encourage her. To make matters worse, the small couch is rather cramped with four people on it — you've ended up sort of crushing Jade into the arm of the couch. You chase off your futile deathly glare with an apologetic glance to Jade, who just softly sighs and shrugs in response.

You get the distraction you've been waiting for when John's darling girlfriend has finally triumphed over the wrapping paper to reveal the treasure that waits beneath. You'd gone through the trouble of getting a generic box, just to conceal the contents and make the suspense even more uncomfortable for John — as Vriska picks at the excessive amount of tape you'd plastered over the end of the box, he gives you a pleading look you can do nothing but answer with your most shit-eating grin. You don't know why this kid even comes home for Christmas. Rose's presents are usually even worse than yours.

John's girlfriend makes short work of the tape with her formidable nails, and before long, the moment has finally come. You cover your mouth as inconspicuously as you can as she pulls out the tangle of shiny black leather from the box — it seems to take her a moment to realize what it is, but you couldn't have _hoped_ for a better reaction.

Holding the harness in her hands, she gives John a strange look that's a bit more peculiar than just the standard bewildered response you'd expect from being gifted a strap-on harness for Christmas. When Vriska speaks, it's all you can do to not devolve into laughter. "How did he...?"

John looks like he just swallowed a rock. "Umm —"

Unperturbed by John's embarrassment, or perhaps encouraged by it, Vriska looks back to you with a coy smile. "Thank you very much. Did John tell you my old one had broken?"

You slowly look over to John, and just as slowly answer in a low and dry voice, "No, he certainly did not."

"What is it?" Eridan asks, his face screwed up in confusion; he's sat on the other side of John, curiously peering over to the gift in Vriska's hands.

"It's a strap-on harness, dear," your mother helpfully pipes up. "See the little ring? That's where the dildo goes so the lady can —"

"I think that's quite enough, Mom," John hastily blusters out, about as red as a firetruck. You can't help but snort.

"Dave, don't do that," your mother reprimands you. She doesn't seem to realize that pursuing the subject is making it much worse for John than if she'd said nothing. "There's nothing wrong with pegging. If John enjoys anal stimulation that is perfectly —"

" _Mom!_ " John hisses.

"Sweetheart, there's no reason to be so embarrassed by it. It certainly doesn't make you any less of a man! I peg your father all of the —"

This time, it's your stepfather who seems just about ready to shit his pants. " _Roxy,_ " he forcefully interrupts. "I don't think that's an appropriate topic of —"

"Whaaaat?" your mother complains. "I'm just trying to be supportive."

John has progressed from the vibrant red of shame to the sickly green of thinking about his father getting fucked in the ass. You have to bite down on your lip very hard to not laugh. Rose looks like she's not much better off than you.

"Maybe we should open the next present?" Kanaya politely suggests.

"Yes, dear, that is a very good idea," Rose says, quickly rising to her feet to hurry over to the tree and grab up the first present she sees — which happens to be a rather large rectangular package. It seems she's decided to take pity on John in finding a present not intended to cause him further misery, of which you are sure there are many in that pile; she hastily checks the tag, then double checks the tag, before finally rolling her eyes and just hauling it over to its recipient. "Here, open this," she commands, shoving the present into Eridan's hands.

"Wow, this is for me?" he says, looking up and down the colorful purple wrapping. It's nearly as tall as he is, and rather wide, but thin in depth. You look around the room, and of course, it must be from your mother — she's practically bouncing in her seat in excitement as Eridan quickly tears off the paper. John and your stepfather are barely paying attention as they struggle to not evacuate the room from shame, but Vriska looks on in unperturbed interest.

"Oh my god," Eridan says.

" _Oh my god,_ " you say.

"Do you like it??" your mother asks. Eridan looks close to tears.

Underneath the wrapping is the most magnificently terrible thing you have ever seen in your life. It's a five foot tall real oil painting of Shrek in a garishly purple wizard's robe, complete with a tall purple hat and an arborous white beard. He's holding a gnarled casting staff in one hand with his other poised over an open book, its pages flipping of their own accord beneath it, while a brilliant magical aura surges around his body. Donkey, stood beside Shrek, looks on with an expression of comical wonder. The colors are so intense and fantastical your eyes are in danger of being burned out of their sockets. _You_ might cry if you look at this piece of shit any longer.

"It's... it's..." Eridan sniffles dramatically. "Ms. Lalonde, this is the most beautiful fuckin' gift I've ever received. I love it so much, I — I — oh _god,_ " he sobs, tears now freely rolling down his cheeks. He has to set the painting down on the floor to rush over to your mother, who flings her arms open to receive him in a hug. She's crying too, now. You lean away from them awkwardly, which motivates Jade to get up from her seat to inspect the painting more closely.

"It's a very well made painting," Jade remarks, looking over it. "Even if its subject matter is a bit... um."

"Amazing," Eridan tearfully provides, noisily sniffling. You narrow your eyes dangerously as Eridan's face draws closer and closer to burrowing into your mother's cleavage. You've scooted as far towards the end of the couch as you can manage.

"Not... not the word I was looking for, but, um, yes, we can go with... with that." Jade awkwardly excuses herself from the painting to take a seat again, this time on the much roomier couch occupied by Rose, Kanaya and your constipated-looking stepfather.

"I commissioned it from Thomas Kinkade," your mother proudly declares, punctuated with a sniffle.

" _Really,_ " Rose sighs, looking upon the painting as if just the sight of it has brought her to the point of exhaustion. 

The present opening ceremony rolls along, each gift its own special opportunity for mortification. The rest of Vriska's presents are just as bad if not worse than yours — Jade got her an imposing tome of a book on female domination, and Rose's was another enormous colorful dildo. You're a little impressed by how well you managed to coordinate that without ever having told each other what you were going to get; you're stricken with a strong urge to hand out some fuckin' high-fives. Your mother and stepfather got her _real_ presents, but those do very little to dull your poor kid brother's shame.

Kanaya, surprisingly, seems to have been hit with softballs from everybody; you just got her a hideous-looking pleather yarmulke, John got her a maternity raincoat, and Jade got her a bag of cat litter. The cat litter would probably even be useful, honestly. You guess she got enough of the First Lalonde Christmas Experience vicariously through Vriska, though.

You get through the Real Presents much more quickly, until all that are left are the ones set aside for _the pool boy_ — from your now terribly despondent mother, you gather that he was supposed to be here today but is running so late she fears he won't be coming. You try to keep your gloating as private as possible. 

"I wanted to have a pool party before dinner," your mother laments. "Oh, poor Tavros, I hope he's okay."

"We can still have a pool party without the pool boy, mother," Rose replies with the eternally exasperated tone she reserves for her darling mother. "You know, it's possible to clean a pool without hired help."

Your mother's reprimand is especially snappy. "Rose, I invited Tavros as a _guest!_ We will _certainly_ be having the pool party, I was simply disappointed that Tavros isn't here and will miss out on the _fun_ that he would be having as our _guest_ —"

"Roxy," your stepfather gently intervenes. "How about you help me get dinner started, and the rest of the kids can go out to the pool?"

Your mother and sister both look equally thankful for the opportunity to disengage. Rose simply rolls her eyes and exits the room as your mother dons a tight smile and tells her husband what a wonderful idea that is. Kanaya, seemingly stricken with the mild panic of being abandoned in the herd, scrambles to her feet to hurry after Rose; you and the rest of the group follow shortly after, past the pile of presents clearly addressed to Dirk left laying against the wall of the hallway. You cringe as everyone else glances over the packages in confusion, and hasten your pace in order to escape as quickly as possible.


	20. Chapter 20

It's not a bad day, all things considered; it's a little cloudy and the air is a bit chilly on your skin, but you've never had much tolerance for the cold to begin with. All the same, you've elected to abstain from the aquatic activities for the time being. You sit on a sunbathing chair by the pool, not doing much of any sunbathing at all between your jeans and tee and the spottily overcast sky — your sister sits on one of the matching chairs beside you, dressed much more appropriately in a muted violet two-piece but nevertheless just as dry as you are. Instead of swimming, she's immersed in what appears to be a rather onerously large tome of a book. You're a bit curious as to what it is, but you can't actually see the cover from this angle, you don't want to bother attempting to divine what it is from glances at the text and you sure as hell don't give enough of a shit to just ask.

The rest of your guests seem to have taken quite aptly to the accommodations, though. Jade and Eridan swim about in the small ocean that passes for your mother's pool enthusiastically, splashing about and causing a great ruckus — even Dirk gets pulled into Jade's juvenile pool games (you hadn't told him to pack swimwear, but he did. You'd figured he'd looked on Google Maps and seen the pool, until you realized you'd never actually given him the address of your mother's place — but that point of confusion was quickly quashed when you remembered you're dating your own fucking stalker). Kanaya seems more inclined to watch and laugh, sat at the edge of the pool with her feet dipped in the water. You keep looking at her boobs. 

Notably missing are John and Vriska; when Vriska discovered that the estate had a pool and she was not informed, and thus lacked any sort of swimwear, she insisted that John drive her to the nearest shop and buy her a bathing suit _immediately_. Vigorously, and without end, until he actually caved and agreed to do it. Your little brother is the most pussywhipped bastard you've ever met.

Notably present, to your enormous displeasure, is the pool boy. Not long after you'd all gathered around the pool, he apparently arrived, was let in and slunk his way out back to tardily join in on the festivities — which brings you to your current state of surliness, arms folded over your chest in disgruntled petulance.

"I just wish he'd go back to where ever the fuck he came from and leave my family alone," you grumble moodily, willing his tight orange speedo to burst into flame and burn his equally tight ass off of his stupid body.

Rose does not look up from her book when she speaks, and her tone is just as flat and dry as her ocular dismissal. "Dave, that's racist."

"What? No. Not to like, Mexico or whatever —"

"If you _weren't_ saying something racist, you most certainly are now," your sister calmly reaffirms.

"Oh, yeah, stick it in a desert rose or two and suddenly you're a fuckin' expert on race relations."

Rose turns a page of her book. "Mhmmm," is her sole condescending mock reply.

You huff indignantly and open your mouth to retort, but your words die in your throat when the sound of the house door opening directs your gaze elsewhere. You look at your mother and your heart stops.

Rose seems to have noticed it too. She very slowly lowers her book down onto her lap, staring at your mother with a stunned open mouth.

"Mom," you sharply say to your mother once she's sauntered within distance, slowly pushing yourself up from your reclined position to sit. "Mom. What the _fuck_ are those?"

"You noticed," your mother playfully answers, batting her eyelashes. You definitely fucking did — it's rather difficult to _not_ notice when your own mother's breasts appear to have grown a cup size and reversed thirty years in age. To your utmost horror, she decides that it's appropriate to cup and squeeze them in her own hands. "Do you like them? Your stepfather got them for me for my birthday!"

"Mother, I don't think that breast augmentation is a customary gift to bestow on one's spouse for their birthday."

"I don't see how _that_ matters," your mother dismisses Rose. All you can do is stare at her, your eyes bugging out of your skull.

You can't take this. They're not even very big implants — they look well done and natural, and you'd have never noticed if you hadn't already been familiar with your mother's rather modest previous rack. They're seriously fucking great tits _and you're absolutely fucking furious about it._

"Mom, god, _god,_ I don't want to think about your tits. You're fucking fifty million years old, you're supposed to be having fucking — fucking _breast cancer_ and mastectomies, not, not —"

"Then don't think about my tits," she defensively says, confidently striding forward to the steps into the shallow end of the pool. Her breasts jiggle as she walks, _oh GOD._

It's all you can do to avert your eyes. 

Although initially perturbed, your sister seems to swiftly identify that this is a prime opportunity to make _you_ uncomfortable. Your attempts to avoid thinking about your family members' breasts are thoroughly sabotaged when Rose contemplatively adds, "You know, they are rather nice. Maybe I'll get a pair myself."

"What? No, don't do that. I like your boobs the way they are," you blurt out. To say it's without thinking seems like a redundant specification.

Rose and your mother both stop and look at you. It's about five long seconds before the words that you said even register in your own mind.

"Uh — I mean, it's not like — I didn't —"

As if that alone weren't enough, Dirk spontaneously emerges from beneath the water near your side of the pool with a passive remark. "Just admit defeat, you dug your own fucking grave with that one," he says.

"You did," Rose seconds with a calm nod, picking back up her book to read as if nothing had happened. 

Dirk swims away, Rose says nothing more and all your mother does is fix you with a coy smile and wade out deeper into the water, her new breasts distressingly buoyant. You contemplate drowning yourself.

In an effort to distract yourself from thoughts of death and humiliation, you choose to stare at Dirk as he swims about in the pool. Things sure would be simpler if he was hideous, you think.

You're startled out of your trance when your mother suddenly speaks out from beside you; you hadn't seen her get out of the pool, and she certainly wasn't in there for long. All the same, she settles into the the unoccupied chair next to you, soaking wet. "Isn't he a little old for you?" she remarks; when you follow her gaze, it's very obvious that she's staring at Dirk's backside. She decides to add to it by idly fanning herself.

" _Mother,_ " you hiss. You do your best to keep your voice low, despite the fact you are incredibly tempted to scream at the top of your lungs. You were already on edge enough and your mother seems to possess a fucking conviction to drive you utterly insane. "Would you _not_ hit on _my boyfriend?_ "

She swats your shoulder with a playful smirk. "Oh, Davey, lighten up a little," she says.

"Oh my god, _go through fucking menopause already._ "

John and Vriska join you by the pool before long; your stepbrother seems to preform the same horrified double-take at seeing your mom's tits as you did, but when he looks to you with a desperately pleading expression all you can do is shake your head.

Vriska seems to have chosen an even skimpier bikini than the salacious trash your mother manages to squeeze into. The flimsy strings that pass for her swimwear don't leave much to the imagination, and you're not sure you even _wanted_ to see that much. She's practically skeletal, with sharp hipbones and visible ribs that leave you stricken with a bizarre urge to go make that girl a fucking sandwich. Vriska, however, seems to have no comprehension of your discomfort or much of anything but ultra-confident bravado, a sultry swagger to every step she takes towards the body of water that resembles more and more a shark tank the nearer she is to it. She catches your eye as she descends into the pool, and although you're quick to avert your gaze, it's not quick enough to escape the chilling predatory stare and disarming smirk she's quick to conjure in response.

Your mother is, of course, quick to gossip. She keeps her voice low, and you certainly hope its subject can't hear from the opposite end of the pool over the loud commotion Jade has diligently sustained. 

"Do you think she has a drug problem?" your mother speculates.

"I don't know," you say with a shrug. "She looks like it, but I don't think John would — well, he has problem with women with shitty personalities, but I don't think he's dated anyone who —"

"Oh, he has," Rose interjects. Your mother nods and you look between the two in confusion.

"He dated a drug dealer for a few months when he was a sophomore in high school," your mother calmly explains. "I think she was 24. I was terribly put out when they broke up. The weed she sold me was really good."

Your mouth just kind of hangs open for a while as you attempt to formulate a response to that. _Jesus Christ, John._

You are thankfully rescued from a need to do so when your stepfather steps through the back door to announce that dinner's almost ready. Your mother lets out a great cheer and leaps to her feet, hurrying back into the building as quickly as she can manage; the rest of the party follows at a somewhat more measured pace.

After you've made your way inside, Rose takes you aside in the hallway. Dirk elects to hover around you despite the fact whatever she has to say to you clearly does not concern him — Rose gives him a mildly irritated look before deciding that she doesn't care enough to bother to attempt to remove him from the vicinity.

" _Please_ don't give Kanaya any trouble at dinner," Rose pleads with you, her tone laced with a tiredly preemptive exasperation. You raise your hands defensively.

"I haven't given her any trouble at _all_ today. I'm not —"

"You _always_ give our partners trouble," Rose sighs. "It's only a matter of time until —"

Your sister's scoldings are interrupted when the sound of footsteps resound upon the steps of the nearby staircase. The three of you look up to the top of the stair at once, and this time, it's Rose who seems the most distraught by what she sees.

"Mother," Rose says, her voice uncharacteristically high and wavering. "What are you wearing?"

"What?" your mother answers as she descends the steps. She looks down at the banded purple sweater in confusion before exclaiming, "Oh! It's just the sweater you made me. I was a bit chilly after being in the pool and I wanted to warm up. What's the matter?"

"Mother. Mother, Kanaya is a _fashion designer_ ," Rose hisses urgently. "She's won _awards_ , Mother! I can't have you wearing my knit in front of her, it's rank amateur work —" 

Your mother seems almost offended on her daughter's behalf, despite the fact the words are coming from Rose herself. "That's ridiculous, it is an absolutely wonderful sweater and I won't hear otherwise," she declares, training a fiercely convicted look on her daughter. Even Rose seems to shrink under her stare.

"I'm not saying it's _bad_ ," Rose hurriedly replies, trying to dodge the worst of her motherly disapproval. "It's just — Kanaya is capable of so much _more_ and I would be embarrassed to —"

"Rose, if this Kanaya is the type of person to belittle your hard work, I don't think I can approve of your relationship."

"What? No, she'd never —" It's a cruel little amusement to see Rose grow so flustered. Dirk seems to be silently sharing in your private mirth. "I just — Mother, please. I just don't want her to see it."

"Well, that's too bad," your mother declares, chin held high. "It was a gift from you and I love you so I'm going to wear it."

Rose desperately looks to you with _help me_ etched in every line of her face, but all you can do is offer her a coy shrug. When Rose seems to gather that she's not going to win this argument, she releases a groan and then _rudely_ shoulders past her mother to hurry upstairs and change herself. Your mother huffs in great offense before turning and indignantly marching towards the dining room.

With a laborious sigh, you lead Dirk up the staircase and closely supervise him in your room as he changes back into dry clothes. You show him back down to the dining room afterwards, and take your seats at the table; Tavros is hard at work setting the places with your mother's ludicrously expensive plates and silverware as you settle in, and you train him with a nasty look that immediately motivates him to look anywhere but at you as he makes his way around the table.

The rest of the group funnels into the dining area gradually. Jade takes her seat on your other side, and Eridan sits next to her; Vriska, John, Rose and Kanaya settle in on the opposite side of the long end of the table. Your mother claims her spot at the head of the table, Tavros awkwardly squeezed in next to her at a table that obviously does not have the room for him to be here.

Your stepfather is the last to arrive, and with him the meal of the evening. However unfavorable your opinion of the man may be, you can't deny he makes one hell of a Christmas feast; he rolls out one extravagant dish after another, piling the table with so much food you're not sure when he had the time to make it all or how the fuck you're supposed to eat it all.

However intimidating, meals are partitioned and you all set into an earnest effort to bloat yourselves with food and die.

Everyone is a little too preoccupied with food at the start for much conversation; your mother, of course, deigns to draw the attention of the table directly to fashion.

"That's a very beautiful dress you're wearing today, Kanaya," your mother shamelessly smarms. She's fishing, and she doesn't even have to keep the line out for long.

"I — I, thank you, Ms— I mean, Roxy. Your sweater is quite lovely, too," Kanaya awkwardly blusters out; your mother immediately lights up brighter than the Christmas tree, but the person who you look to for a reaction is Rose. Your sister seems to have frozen in her place like a statue, and you notice a crimson blush slowly blooming across her cheeks.

"That's incredibly kind of you to say, dear!" your mother exuberantly exclaims. Rose looks stuck in a confused state of flattered mortification. "Actually, _Rosie_ made it for me."

"Oh, you did?" Kanaya asks, looking quizzically to Rose by her side.

Rose can't seem to help but lower her head, and when she replies, her voice is terribly small. "Er. Yes, I... I suppose I did make it."

"You never told me you knit."

You have to struggle not to laugh at the look on Rose's face and the way she trips over her words. "Well, it was only — I haven't for quite some time, it was really only a hobby — when I was much younger — that sweater is quite old —"

"It's a shame that you stopped. You're quite good," Kanaya declares, before returning to politely eating the food on her plate. You don't think she even noticed how flustered Rose was.

"I, ah. Thank you." 

The smug _I told you_ so look your mother gives Rose and the constipated expression she returns are spectacular.

John decides this is as good a time as any to clear his throat, drawing attention away from Rose, much to her relief. "Well, since we're all here — I, well — Vriska and I have an announcement we'd like to make," he says, pulling the dining room into an expectant silence.

_Oh no. Oh fuck no._

"Well, go on!" your mother encourages. In stark contrast to your own sour demeanor, your mother sounds positively elated to hear whatever idiot news about what John's decided to do with this crazy broad.

"We're getting married," John blurts out. Getting it out seems to be such a weight off his chest that he immediately does this little awkward laugh, and breaks into a big goofy grin.

The table erupts into a cacophony of congratulatory fanfare; the party trips over each other with glowing praise, the cries of "That's wonderful!" and "I'm so happy for you!" blurring into a near unintelligible mass of noise. Even _Dirk_ manages a tepid " _that's nice_ ". You, however, notably refrain from any comment, your face drawn carefully blank.

"Dave," your mother sternly says, drawing your attention — and the attention of the rest of the table, which quickly falls quiet. "Aren't you going to congratulate your brother?" All eyes are on you.

What the fuck?? Why are you the only person who thinks this is fucking nuts? Even _Rose_ is giving you that _oh, Dave, just suck it up_ look.

"Yeah. Grats," you dryly answer, and you see John tense up quite a bit at your completely insincere delivery. Your mother is glaring fucking daggers at you now, and Rose is just swirling her wine about in her glass with a cast off expression that telegraphs _here we go again,_ but no one seems inclined to start a scene, so you aren't challenged further. Everyone else at the table not acquainted with your familial drama seems rather confused and discomforted by the stark change of mood — especially Vriska, who seems about ready to start some shit — but when none of the rest of you say anything, they keep quiet.

Your mother seems determined to redirect the atmosphere into more positive avenues, so instead she turns to John and Vriska and brightly asks, "Have you set a date yet?"

John seems to have recovered from your slight. He looks to Vriska and his smile finds its way back. "Not officially yet? But I think we want to do it this summer, after I've finished this semester. That's right, right?"

"Mhmm," Vriska answers.

"Oh, I love weddings. You _must_ let me help plan!" your mother exclaims.

"Well, uh. All right, I guess. Why not?" John replies. Oh, he is going to regret that. Vriska certainly looks irritated by the suggestion — it seems she isn't keen on anyone usurping her big day. You suppose she's confident enough that she can get out of it, though, because she raises no objection.

"It seems like everybody has settled down but me!" Jade declares. From anyone else it'd probably be a terribly depressing statement, but her unerringly chipper voice dulls the impact. That doesn't stop a rather intense wave of guilt from overtaking you.

You do your best to maintain some the levity — there's always some to be found at Ampora's expense. "Hey, at least you're not still a virgin at thirty," you say with a pointed look in Eridan's direction, chasing the petty and unsolicited burn with a sip of your wine.

"Hey!" both Eridan and your mother cry out in offended unison.

"Come on, dude," you joke, but it's one of those jokes where you say what you actually mean but pretend it was meant to be a joke. "It's kinda sad."

Jade offers a half-hearted laugh. "Oh, be nice."

"Aren't you supposed to become a wizard if you make it to thirty without losing your virginity?" Rose dryly says, swirling around her wine again. She seems more interested in playing with it than drinking it. 

"Really?" Eridan asks, earnest interest flashing across his face. Holy shit, this kid.

Tavros seems oddly intrigued by this line of conversation as well, and speaks up in a quiet voice, "But do you stay a wizard if you lose it after that?"

"Who knows?" Rose answers with a shrug.

"Tavros, sweetie, you have nothing to worry about," your mother says, reaching over to put her hand on his knee beneath the table. _God dammit, Mom._ "With buns like those I'm sure you'll have no trouble finding a nice girl who wants to be with you!" She quickly looks over to you and Dirk and before you can spit out a _don't drag us into this you old fucking hag_ she adds, "Or a nice boy! Whatever you like, honeybear."

Dirk shrugs. Until this point he'd been doing you the gracious favor of keeping his fucking mouth shut, but you knew that couldn't have lasted long. "I'd fuck him," Dirk casually offers. Tavros looks like every capillary in his face has burst. 

"See? I told you!"

You kick Dirk under the table and he kicks you back twice as hard, causing you to yelp in a decidedly unmanly fashion. "Fuck all of you," you spit out after several moments of being stared at.

To your relief, however, your stepfather seems keen on turning the direction of the conversation onto Vriska. It appears John's idiotic marriage bomb is at least keeping the spotlight off you and your own disaster of a love life. "So, Vriska," he begins, his voice carefully polite. "What do you like to do?"

"I manipulate the stock market," Vriska smoothly answers, as if it were the only answer she could have given. 

"Oh. That's very interesting," he says. He always speaks in such a consistently even, dadly way that you always get the immediate impression that his deadpan is sarcasm — it's like his intense, unwavering sincerity wraps back around into this kind of bizarre false insincerity that isn't actually insincere at all but still pisses the hell out of you? You really don't like your stepfather, is basically what you are getting at. "Are you any good at it?"

Vriska seems almost offended by the suggestion, her reply arrogantly bold, "Mr. Egbert, I think you will find that I am very good at _eeeeeeeeverything_ that I do."

"Pretty much," John replies in that whipped and lovestruck way of his. There's no way this isn't gonna crash and fucking burn.

"How did you and John meet?" your mother asks next; it seems like the parental deposition is out in full tonight. Both she and your stepfather have Vriska trained with dangerously scrutinizing eyes.

John immediately blanches, and cuts Vriska off when she opens her mouth. "I met her when I was doing premed at Berkeley," he hastily says. You narrow your eyes suspiciously — you know this kid too well, and that was a fuckin' lie if you've ever seen it. You let it go for now, though.

"Oh! What did you study, Vriska?"

"Business," Vriska replies. "I didn't finish, though. I got bored and dropped out." If she thinks anything peculiar about that, her tone doesn't betray it.

Your mother looks like she's about to have a typical Disapproving Old White Lady response from her initial expression, but she corrects course in near to an instant when she remembers you exist. "Oh, I see. There's nothing wrong with dropping out! Dave dropped out of college and he is doing very well. I'm glad you've decided to pursue what makes you happy, Vriska."

You remember how pissed she was when you dropped out. You can't help but take that comment a little sour — yeah, sure, it's good enough for her over a fucking decade later now that you're rich and famous and bought her the very enormous house she lives in. 

"The only reason I went in the first place was my mother," Vriska says, apparently unaware that she's speaking with her mouth full. You notice your stepfather cringe; you're not sure how that still bothers him with so many years with Jade at the table. "She _insisted_ that I go to college and get a degree, even though _she_ never had it in her to get one. Hmph."

Rose makes a curious inquiry. "You said your name was... Serket, right?"

"Yeah, why?"

"Your mother wouldn't happen to be Aranea Serket, would she?"

Vriska immediately looks like she's bit into a rotten lemon. "How did you know that??" she demands, the pitch of her voice rising.

"I'm... acquainted with her work, is all," Rose says, a bit defensively. "We met once, through our publisher. She told me her real name. It was quite some time ago, but I remember her being pleasant, if talkative." 

"What, are you a writer too or something?"

It seems that despite all her attempts to distance herself from celebrity life, even Rose is susceptible to brattiness; she looks decidedly offended that Vriska hadn't already known who she was. John just looks embarrassed.

"Rose is very famous. I'm surprised you haven't heard of her," Kanaya proudly declares; Rose appears immediately thankful that she didn't have to be the person to say those words herself.

"What'd she do?" Vriska asks.

"She wrote Complacency of the Learned," John hastily answers, the heat in his face steadily rising. This is obviously not going how he'd planned.

"Oh. I've seen those around. Never read them, though." _They looked dumb,_ Vriska communicates with a barely concealed upward roll of her eyes.

"I've read most of your mother's work," Rose says, her tone oddly snotty. You're not sure how that was supposed to be a burn. Maybe you just don't understand the intricacies of female passive-aggression. "She's a very... dedicated author. You ought to be proud of her."

That seems to have hit a nerve. " _Proud_ of her?? Why would I be proud of her? She's a _complete_ fake," Vriska objects, this time rolling her eyes dramatically. "I am _so_ sick of her stupid pirate stories, oh my _GOD_."

"I thought you loved pirates," John says, confused. 

"I love _real pirates,_ not the totally fake pirates that my mom makes up. I used to like them when I was little, but, um, hello? They're all such blatant wish fulfillment fantasies! She writes all these grand sweeping epics about all the things she wishes she could do but can't because she's a _total coward,_ " Vriska rants, gesticulating wildly all the while. "It is soooooooo pathetic!"

"I don't think you quite understand how writing _works,_ " Rose breaks in. There's an edge to her tone that tells you this isn't going anywhere good. "It's not a matter of writing about the things you wish you could do but can't, it's —"

Vriska apparently didn't find it necessary to wait for Rose to finish before she loudly blusters back into the argument. "I mean, sure, she _probably_ can't be a _real pirate,_ but that's not an excuse to not try. Like, with Somalia and everything now. She never tries at anything! The only thing she's ever done with her life is sit inside and write _books_ all day!"

Rose is definitely getting mad now. Her lips drawn into a thin line, she protests, "Writing a book isn't _nothi_ —"

"Your entire legacy is _fake,_ " Vriska emphatically declares. "People will remember you, but not for anything you actually _did_. None of it is real, it's all —"

Rose snippily cuts in. "It's real enough to me. I've spent countless years of my life toiling away on my work, and it's neither —"

"I never said it was _easy,_ just that it's _not worth anything._ What do books even _do_??? You spend all that time and effort and money writing and for what, words on a page?! What even _is_ that?"

Rose doesn't even seem to know how to reply, her mouth hanging open in a stunned shock. Vriska doesn't quite catch on to the meaning of that shock, though, and is only egged on by your sister's speechlessness. "Think of all the things you could be doing with that time!! You could be out in the world, _doing_ things, _being_ somebody, making a difference in people's lives — but instead you _make up stories that aren't even real_??"

Rose seems to opt to take the high road, or at least the highway of passive-aggressive disdain, returning to her plate with a frosty dismissal. "You seem to have unresolved issues with your mother that have maligned you to authors and writers in general, so I think it's best that I excuse myself from this discussion. This is _clearly_ going nowhere."

" _Clearly,_ " Vriska echos with a nasty look. John's face is _so fucking red_.

"I'd appreciate it if you wouldn't insult my daughter's life's work," your mother sternly says, training her most scathing motherly disapproval on Vriska. Oh, do you _love_ that look right now. Somehow, you doubt anyone is going to be giving you shit for being bitchy with Vriska after _that_ — your mother, stepfather and Kanaya look rightly pissed, Dirk seems amused by the drama, Jade and Tavros are just embarrassed, and John looks like he's about to die from shame. Eridan has no idea what's going on, obviously. 

"I'm sorry," John hastily attempts to apologize. "She didn't mean it, she —"

"No, I meant it," Vriska says, looking to John with an expression that clearly broadcasts that she neither understands he was attempting to do some serious damage control or that anything she said was that offensive in the first place. _What a fucking winner, bro._

John just clams up and the table descends into an awkward silence. You just return to eat, and it's only when everyone has just about cleared their plates does anyone speak up again.

"Dave, would you like to help me with the dishes?"

You look up at the sound of your stepfather's voice, and the whole room goes even more impossibly quiet than it already was. It's like the whole world began to hold its breath. Your mother's look of anger has turned into embarrassment; Rose is giving you her most warning glare; John and Jade turn tense and uncomfortable. The rest of your family's guests clearly notice something's changed with the already shitty atmosphere of the room, but none of them speak up in their confusion. Only Eridan seems to remain oblivious, the sounds of his knife and fork scraping against his nearly empty plate the only interruption to the silence.

All eyes are on you, just waiting for you to make a scene. You linger in the tense stillness for a moment before you slowly rise to your feet; it's like letting the air out of a balloon, all of the anxiety in the room dissipating at once. You'd be mildly insulted your entire family seemed to expect you to throw a temper tantrum if you hadn't done things exactly like that hundreds of times before.

You go around the table and help your stepfather collect the plates, and wordlessly follow after him into the kitchen. You leave the piles of dirty plates next to sink and move to open the dishwasher, but Egbert interrupts you.

"Let's wash these by hand," he says. He rolls up his sleeves and pulls a plate off the pile to rinse off and begin scrubbing.

You stop, still half bent over, and look back to him in irritation. "... Why?" you ask, impatience lacing your voice.

"There's value in hard work."

You think it's thoroughly ridiculous but you don't have the energy to fight about it. You just sigh histrionically, being sure to broadcast your displeasure, and move back over to the sink to assist. The two of you get through scrubbing and drying a couple of plates before he speaks up again.

"I just want you to know I support you."

You don't look up from the plate you're drying. "Not sure why you think I give a shit," you say, tone carefully blank. You can feel him tense up next to you, but he keeps trying anyway.

"I don't want you to think I'd judge you for —"

"Wow, good job, you don't hate me because I suck dick. Really appreciate all the hard work that must have gone into that. Dad of the fucking year right there."

You nearly jump when the sound of a plate clattering into the sink resounds through the kitchen, but you catch yourself and your shades conceal the bulk of your surprise. You act like nothing's happened, and just pick up another plate to dry.

Egbert just stares at you, dismay clearly etched across his face. "What do I have to do to make you not hate me?"

You pause to give him a dismissively condescending look. "Not bothering me with this dog shit would be a start."

"I've been nothing but kind to you, Dave," he says, apparently choosing to disregard your suggestion that he shut the fuck up. "I gave you a home and an education. I put up with it when you yelled at me and called me awful things, I looked the other way from your childish attempts to sabotage my relationship with your mother, I _forgave_ you when you nearly killed my son, I —"

"Killed him?" you snort, carefully keeping your tone flippant and dismissive. He hates it when you act like you just don't give a shit about any of the things he's saying, which naturally lead to it being ingrained as a habit. "You've gotta be fucking kidding me."

You can tell that Egbert is losing his patience; it's growing harder for him to keep his voice down, his tone strained. "You _pushed him down the stairs,_ Dave! He could have broken his neck!"

"But he didn't," you say. You pick up a plate to scrub, since your stepfather has stopped. "He was fine."

"He was in the hospital for two weeks!"

"I can't believe you're still hung up on this. Me and John have been cool about it for like ten years."

Egbert is quiet for a moment, his eyes hard and his jaw set; you can tell it's a struggle to let the argument go, but he knows he won't win. He returns to his original point, his voice tinged with a superior temperance that makes anger flare in your gut. " _I let it go_ because I _understood_ why you were the way you were and I thought — I thought if I was just kind, if I just waited, you would _grow up_. But you haven't. You are thirty-three years old and you are as much a child as the boy I met twenty years ago."

It's an argument you've had so many times before, each more impossibly tiresome than the last. You hate him more than even you know is reasonable, but your acknowledgment of the irrationality of it all doesn't dull the intensity of the emotion. You open your mouth for a heated retort, but your altercation is interrupted by the sound of nervous footsteps.

At once the both of you look up to the doorway to find a mortified Tavros, frozen like a deer in the headlights. He opens and closes his mouth a few times before he finally ekes out, "I-I uh, just wanted to get a glass of water —"

"Of course, son," your stepfather breathes. He almost sounds a little relieved.

Tavros awkwardly walks over to the sink to refill his glass; you and your stepfather move aside to give him room, and settle for giving each other frosty looks over the poor pool boy's back. Once he's filled his glass, he mutters an embarrassed apology and flees the room at once.

Left alone together again, the two of you share a moment of awkward tension. When he speaks again, Egbert quietly says, "Just help me put the rest of these in the dishwasher."


	21. Chapter 21

After the dinner your mother herds you all back out to the pool, chasing after that already filling dinner with a barbecue party. You initially think your mother is a bit insane, but it seems that plenty of the guests seem to be well capable of eating even more and swimming in the chilly weather. Then again, maybe you're the crazy one for feeling cold in 65 degree weather. 

You hang off to the side beneath the awning of the back side of the house as the hours tick late, nursing an appletini your mother had prepared specially for you. You were never quite able to decide how drunk you wanted to get, so you settled on an indecisively glacial imbibery; you're mostly just bored, at this point. Post-dinner drama has been fairly sparse, leaving you without a reasonable excuse to get completely shitfaced and exit reality.

Rose sidles up to you with her own drink, and the two of you sit in a comfortable silence for a while, watching the rest of the party unfold from a distance. To your surprise, it seems like Dirk and Jade have come to some sort of amicable arrangement over the evening — either that, or she is direly misinterpreting his attempts to drown her.

Eventually, your sister speaks speaks in a low voice, "While it's not like I don't appreciate the sentiment, it wasn't necessary to tell her about it."

You turn your head to look to her in genuine confusion. It's been long enough and just enough gin that you have no fucking clue what she's talking about. "Tell who about what?"

"Tell Kanaya to compliment the sweater I made for Mother," Rose smoothly replies, with that self-assured tone to her voice she always gets when she thinks she's been terribly clever and perceptive.

"I didn't say anything to her about it."

Rose looks to you, something quite reminiscent of doubt spreading across her face. It's like she'd never even considered that Kanaya might have genuinely just liked her sweater. "... You really didn't?" she asks, as if she were expecting you to just tell her you're just fucking with her.

"I really didn't," you echo. "I haven't even been alone with her once the entire time she's been here, I wouldn't even have had an opportunity to — your wife is just an actually decent person. Who would have thought."

Your sister looks back away from you again, this time with a small little smile. You follow her gaze to Kanaya, who presently appears to be entertaining an increasingly drunk Eridan. "A decent person, huh? It seems I've dodged the Dave Lalonde Spousal Disapproval bullet. How curious."

"I don't hate everyone's significant others for _no reason_. Kanaya seems like she's actually very nice," you defensively reply. "She's also incredibly fucking hot, holy shit."

"Dave," Rose sighs.

"No, really. Her legs are fucking infinite, god damn. I'd hit that like a freight train."

"If you aren't careful with that tongue of yours, I'll cut it off."

"Just allow me a last meal," you snigger; the implication isn't lost on your sister.

After a sharp look with narrowed eyes, Rose steps away from you and sets into a confident stride across the patio to where Kanaya currently stands by the pool. Unable to hear from your distance, you watch as Rose interrupts her stilted conversation with Eridan to stand up onto her toes and whisper something into Kanaya's ear that turns the taller woman's face a magnificent shade of red. Rose takes her lady by the hand and, eyes resolutely trained on you, quickly tugs her along past you to the door; you meet Rose's gaze with a raised eyebrow and receive a coy smile in return — and a flustered look from Kanaya — before the pair disappears inside the safety of the empty house. 

"Well, at least _one_ of us is getting lucky tonight," Dirk loudly announces from beside you, and the sudden sound of his voice makes you jump so badly you spill your drink all down the front of your shirt and pants.

" _Shit!_ " you curse as quietly as you can restrain yourself, fretting as the cool air against the cold liquid of your drink on your skin threatens to freeze you to death. Dirk laughs mercilessly at your discomfort as you gingerly separate your damp shirt from your body with a thumb and forefinger, as if that were meant to be any fucking help at all; you give him a futile scathing look and more than his fair share of invectives, but those prove to be just as fruitless as your subsequent attempt to escape him by retreating into the building. Dirk lazily trails behind you as you hurriedly make your way through the house to the stairs, and rush up to the second floor where your (thankfully, excessively heated) bedroom is located.

You have the forethought to lock the door behind you, so when Dirk catches up with you, your hasty and aggravated disrobing is protected by a solid barrier of wall. He tries to turn the doorknob, yanking it forcefully enough that you think he was legitimately making an attempt to break the lock — but one upside of your mother's ludicrously expensive abode is that there is actually some sturdiness of construction to the fucking thing, and he doesn't seem inclined to go as far as literally trying to fucking kick the door down. Instead, he settles for loudly complaining in his defeat. "Come on, let me in," he beseeches you, his voice muffled by the thick separation.

"No," you bark in reply, with all the cadence of a defiantly petulant child.

"Don't be like that. I'm sorry I made you spill your pisswater baby juice all over yourself or whatever."

"Go away." Your efforts to undress yourself appear to have been abandoned in favor of anxiously arguing with Dirk over fucking nothing.

"Why?"

"Because you're gonna skeeze all over me again."

"So?"

"Jesus, just go back down to the party. I'll come back down when I've changed."

"I don't want to go down there by myself," he complains with ridiculously feigned pitiability. "Besides, it's late. I wanna go to bed. Let me in."

"No you don't. Go away."

There's a brief moment of silence before, to your surprise, he seems to actually... _go away._ "Fine, if that's how it's going to be," he announces, and it's not long before you hear the sound of his footsteps receding away from the door.

That was... oddly easy.

A bit surprised, but nonetheless relieved, you finish heaping your soiled clothes lazily upon the ground and make your way to the bathroom to clean up. You just dampen a towel and give yourself a pass over your most notably wet areas (which is a bewildering stretch of your body — your glass didn't even hold that much fucking liquid, Jesus). When you're satisfied that you are cleaned enough to be seen, you return to the bedroom and acquire a clean set of clothes to redress yourself with.

Just as you've finished pulling on your shirt, though, you hear a familiar pattern of heavy footfalls returning to the door of your bedroom shortly followed by a disconcerting rattling of the doorknob. "What the fuck are you doing?" you demand in irritation.

"Nothing," Dirk innocently answers, seconds before the door swings open to reveal him and the bobby pin he has held arrogantly aloft.

You stop just after successfully managing to do up the fly of your pants and look at him. He looks back at you with an unbearable expression. All you can do is drag your hand down your face in exasperation. "You're a stupid fucking bastard," you sigh.

"I'll cop to bein' a fucking bastard, but I ain't stupid," he retorts, ramping up his passive gloating triumph into an insufferably smug grin.

You're not sure what to do, at this point. Try to run for the door? Kick him in the balls and hope he loses interest? Give up and just let him fuck you? It'd probably be less stress and effort than trying to hold off.

Frozen by indecision, you seem to settle for defensively crossing your arms over your chest and backing away towards the wall with each step into the room he takes, however futile the effort may be. You furrow your brow, set your jaw and train your most loathsome glare upon him, and when he's inches from you you brace yourself for impact —

— which passes very suddenly when he elects to flop down onto the bed instead.

You sort of just look at him incredulously and he stares back at you with this _what of it, fucker_ expression and you do not even know what to _do_ with this man.

Your mouth opens and closes several times before you managed a befuddled, "The hell are you doing?"

"What's it look like I'm doing, shitstop?" he replies. For effect, he theatrically kicks off his shoes, throws back the sheets and settles contentedly into his place. "I'm going to bed."

"You picked the lock on the door to go to bed."

"Yeah? How else was I going to get into the bed?"

"You could have just gone back in after I left."

"But I wanted to go to bed now."

You stare at him. He stares at you. You should know better than to try to win at this game.

You turn and walk to the door, expecting him to follow. You look back and see that he hasn't. You step over the threshold and look back again. Dirk slowly raises a single brow. An acute feeling of aggravation wells up in your chest despite the fact that that is exactly what he wants and that knowledge only compounds the frustration. You avert your eyes as the heat begins to rise in your face and awkwardly shut the door behind you, doing your best to push him and his bullshit from your mind. You're not going to let him get to you.

For lack of anything else to do, you go back down to the party. It's getting late, and most of the guests have turned in by this point; all that're left are Eridan, Tavros, Vriska and your mother, and from the looks of it, it seems that for once your _mother_ is the only distressingly sober one at the party. She looks to you as you step outside with a plaintive expression, and you follow her gaze back to the rather peculiar scene unfolding on the other side of the pool from where she is sat — Vriska appears to be seated on one of the patio chairs with her feet propped up on a decidedly disconsolate Tavros's back, whom was apparently coerced into situating himself before her on his hands and knees as a makeshift footrest. Even more inexplicable is Eridan, knelt before the both of them with his hands folded in front of him, muttering words you can't parse from this distance — from the somewhat flummoxed expression on Vriska's face, you can hazard a guess that that was not exactly what she meant when she'd drunkenly instructed Eridan to worship her feet.

You look back to your mother. She looks back to you.

Without a word, you turn on your heel and reenter the building.

 

***

 

"Crawling back so soon," Dirk mocks you as you let yourself back into the bedroom. All you can do is sigh.

"Eridan was trying to worship Vriska's feet."

"I see."

Well, there's no escaping it now. You need to go to sleep, and it's probably going to have to happen in this bed. You could have snuck off to one of the other guest bedrooms, but there's no guarantee that Dirk wouldn't have just picked his way into one of those. Though, you suppose you could have... barricaded the door.

It all just seems a little fucking ridiculous.

You say as much when you tentatively crawl into bed besides Dirk, but decline to offer context. You put as much distance between yourself and your brother as you can manage, and turn your back to him once you've settled in; you hope he'll just let that be the last of it.

Predictably, it's not long after you've settled in that Dirk starts getting handsy.

At first, he just sidles up against your back and throws an arm over your waist — you stiffen defensively, but when he doesn't immediately push things any further, you allow yourself to relax.

Sometimes, when you look back at your life, you realize you're sort of dumb.

As soon as you've closed your eyes and let your guard fall, Dirk returns to task. He draws you closer to his body, shifting around to pester you more effectively. He twists himself around you and kisses your throat and jaw and the lobe of your ear, his hand slowly trailing down your body to palm invasively at your junk. You hastily grab his wrist and remove it from the premises. 

"Come on," he urges you, nipping at your neck in a way that draws a sharp breath from your throat despite yourself. You can feel his steadily hardening erection pressed up against you, and your squirming only seems to worsen the issue.

" _I told you,_ " you hiss, swatting his hand away from your crotch once again. "Not in my mom's house."

He sets into some infuriating pseudo-compliance — instead of returning to your dick, Dirk opts to slip his hand up your shirt to rub and pinch your nipples. You are beyond seriously fucking annoyed. You're annoyed with him for pushing this fucking shit, and much more than that you're annoyed with yourself for fucking falling for this unbelievably transparent ploy. Worst of all is that you're starting to get a boner, which will doubtlessly be an encouragement to him regardless of how involuntary its nature.

You wrench away from him and turn to face him, brow drawn together in frustration. You open your mouth to protest but he cuts you off before the words leave your lips.

"What if I let you fuck me?" he suggests, running his tongue out over his lips.

_God dammit._

The moment you look at his face, you can tell he knows he's won. A shit-eating little smirk works its way onto his lips, and his hands immediately move to pull his shirt over his head.

While you _really, really_ don't want to have sex in your mother's house, you haven't actually had a chance to fuck him again since you managed to wheedle him into it the second time however many months ago. You didn't want to push the issue, because in hindsight you were sort of a cock about it — a lot more than sort of a cock — and despite his agreement that he'd be willing to do it again, he never attempted to initiate it himself. You don't know when you'll have an opportunity like this again.

Still, you have to raise a flimsy objection. "I didn't even bring any lube —"

"I did," Dirk quickly says. Before you have time to object, he pushes off of the bed and makes his way to the bag he'd left laying against a wall, hastily rooting through its contents until he locates what he's looking for. You sit up and watch him in exasperated surrender as he turns, stalks back to you, tosses you the container of lube and begins removing his pants at the foot of the bed.

With a small sight, you relent and remove your shirt; by the time you have it over your head he's back upon you again, shoving you roughly into the bed with the weight of his body. He licks your neck, bites at your ear and jaw and ruts against you with his now unrestrained and decidedly raging erection. Fisting your hand in his hair, you release a ragged breath; you draw it in back sharply again when he slips beneath your pants and your briefs and pulls you into his hand. Sure enough, there's no turning back from here; you're hard as a rock and you've well passed the threshold of giving a shit. You're not sure why you bothered to fight it in the first place.

It's sort of an awkward fumble to get your pants off, but somehow the both of you manage to collaborate to success. Despite your earlier reticence, you seem to have uncovered a remarkable wellspring of enthusiasm — you both clumsily and blindly grope across the bed for the lubricant, and your tenacity proves supreme. Gracelessly, you pry open the cap of the tube and essentially explode the container between your body and his.

Dirk pauses and draws back, looking down at you with a condescending eye. "Good fucking going, buddy."

You sigh as you survey the magnificent mess you've managed to spill all over your stomach and thighs. In an effort to salvage the situation, you run your hand over your skin to collect as much of the lubricant as possible and smear it liberally over your dick. You shudder at the light, cool touch of your own hand in your sore neglect.

Dirk rolls his eyes and joins in on the effort, pulling back up to his knees to swipe his fingers brusquely through the fluid on your stomach and redirect it to more practical locations. He's very quick to prove once again that he's not much for waiting; he's applied only a cursory amount of lube to himself before he's lifting himself up and positioning you for what is probably a sorely premature entry.

"Come on, dude, you've done this like _twice,_ you shouldn't —"

"Shut up," he says, and sinks down onto your dick.

Just as you'd expected, he's so tight that the crushing sensation of him around you is almost painful. You can tell he regrets it the moment you see the look on his face. He's quick to hide it, but you know the signs well enough; he's tense and grows tenser and he doesn't even make it all the way down, his hands curling into claws to dig into his own spread thighs.

"You're a fucking idiot," you're kind enough to inform him, gently placing your hands on his hips to guide him away from his bad decision. He winces reflexively as you shift him forward to sit astride your stomach, your dick maddeningly pressed up along the cleft of his ass.

"And you're a damn tease," he accuses you. "Little pent up, here."

"Oh, shut the fuck up."

Before he can react, you have him flipped over onto his back with his wrists pinned beside his head. Your hands are still gross and slippery from your lubricant mishap, but he doesn't fight the restraint; he chooses instead to simply arch up against you in just such a way to drive you _absolutely fucking crazy,_ and when you kiss his lips you draw blood.

You reach your hand down to clumsily fumble about in the slick mess you created between your bodies; after enough blind trial and error, your fingers manage to find the entrance to Dirk's ass and you waste no further time in loosening him up. You work quickly, escalating one finger to two to three and he's still tight but with enough lube and effort you bring him to the point where you're satisfied you're not going to break him.

For all your years of experience, you find yourself spectacularly graceless. You withdraw your fingers and aren't even really sure what to do with them — it's like you've entirely fucking forgotten how fucking somebody even _works_. You awkwardly wipe the accumulated lubricant off your fingers onto Dirk's thigh, and when you settle between his spread legs you feel more than a little self-conscious.

Thankfully, your dick at least remains up to the task. You brace yourself over Dirk's body with one hand and take hold of yourself with the other, and with just a small push you've gotten the head inside.

He's still tense, but not nearly as much as before — and your entry doesn't elicit an immediate grimace of horrible pain, which is likely a good sign. You give him a moment to acclimate before you slowly inch in deeper; your arms begin to slightly tremble from the tantalizing pressure and sensation, so you lean in closer to press your lips to his.

Apparently not pleased with your tortuously slow pace, Dirk decides that the best course of action is to forcefully wrap his legs around your waist so that you're driven in to the hilt; you falter in your surprise, and he bites down on your lip hard enough for it to split. 

Your immediate reflex is to curse and pull back, but Dirk's hand shoots out to curl around the back of your neck and roughly pull you back down to his level — he whispers a raspy taunt into your ear. "Come on, you can do better than this."

If he was trying to make you angry, it worked. Your brow draws and you clench your teeth and you'd be lying if you said you weren't trying to hurt him when you give him the brutal thrust he seems to want. His breath catches in his throat when you slam into him and his nails dig into your skin and when you bite into the crook of his neck you're both brought to blood.

Dirk isn't content to allow you control for very long. You barely know what's hit you before he's pushed you off and turned you over beneath him — you try to fight him off at first, but you quickly learn that you have little chance of victory when he doesn't _want_ you to win. In absence of any other recourse, you release a deep breath and let it happen.

He's having a much easier time of it this go around; you let yourself relax as he settles astride you, and there's little to no resistance when he guides you back inside. You breathe out sharply as the heat envelopes you again, and Dirk wastes little time before he begins to rock his hips in a steadily building pace. Your hands move to grip and squeeze his thighs and ass as he rides you, tight and hot; you look at his body and you want to _devour_ him, and for just a little while you let yourself forget all of your frustration. You thrust up into him in time with his own movements, far beyond the point of any care for restraint — you just let yourself _go_.

And go you do, abruptly inside of him with a strangled cry — and from the look on his face as you're coming down off of your high, he didn't seem to be expecting it. He gives you a strange _look_ as he slows to a halt. "Little early there, kid."

"It's not like there was anything I could have done about it," you defend yourself. It's a half-hearted protest, though; in your post-orgasmic haze, you can't really find a single fuck to give.

So Dirk gives a great dramatic sigh, like you're just such a pain in his ass, and crawls his way up your body to unceremoniously shove his dick straight into your mouth. 

You can feel the rather off-putting sensation of his ass dripping out onto your neck and chest as he rather callously uses your face as a fuck-toy, but you suppose your own enjoyment is a little past the point at this stage. You just put up with it, and do your best to participate in whatever meager way you can manage in your awkward position; it feels like a bizarre little eternity before he's filled your mouth. You swallow without incident, and Dirk doesn't say anything to you after pulling out. He pushes off of you and settles into his place in bed, back to you, and that appears to be that.

You sit up and rub your sore jaw, and you're immediately treated to the feeling of your own semen running down your chest and stomach. With a small sigh, you get up and haul yourself to the attached bathroom to clean up. You spit what's left of him in your mouth into the sink, wipe yourself down with a clean towel, and brush your teeth. You feel oddly filthy, but you're too exhausted to take another shower.

After shutting off all the lights, you blindly find your way back to bed and climb in. You focus on the slowly resolving silhouette of Dirk's rising and falling chest beside you as your eyes acclimate to the darkness.

Dirk is quick to fall into sleep, but you lay awake in bed for long after. You stare at the ceiling restlessly; you don't even know what you're stressing out about now. You feel a bit strange. You're not mad, exactly — you feel a bit relieved, honestly, now that it's all said and done and his insatiable libido is no longer inescapably hanging over your head. You can't say you didn't enjoy yourself at all. Your day even went pretty well, all things considered — your mother liked Dirk, and Dirk managed to avoid doing _too_ awful to embarrass you in front of your entire family.

But you still can't sleep. With a sigh, you carefully and quietly pull yourself out of bed and tiptoe out of the room, softly shutting the door behind you. You have to watch your step carefully to avoid causing the stairs to creak; Rose is a light sleeper and will undoubtedly complain if you were to wake her up.

You make it down to the ground floor as stealthily as you can manage. You figure you may as well go out and sit by the pool for a while, for lack of anything better to do. You make your way to the back of the house, but when you step outside, you're surprised to find you're not alone.

"What are you doing out here?" you ask when you notice your mother's presence, lain out leisurely on one of the reclining chairs near the pool.

Your mother looks up to you in surprise, a drink in hand she evidently still hasn't touched. "I was about to ask you the same thing," she answers. "Couldn't sleep?"

"Yeah," you say. You shuffle over to take a seat in the empty chair next to your mother by the pool, releasing a long sigh. You're certainly tired, despite your restlessness. 

The two of you sit in a comfortable silence for a long time, looking out over the pool and the expansive back yard. It's chilly, with the nighttime breeze; the branches of the trees in the distance sway quietly in the gentle wind. It's calming.

"You know, it's funny," your mother eventually says in a quiet voice. You look to her in attention, waiting for her to continue. "Do you remember the year we lived in Texas while I was interning with Skaianet?"

You think before you answer. "Only vaguely."

It takes her a few moments to find the words to carry on. "Those first few months were so hard," she says. It's a strange thing to hear your mom sounding sad. "All I wanted was to be your mother, but you just... wouldn't let me. You wouldn't talk to me or Rose, all you'd do is hide up in your room and draw — you'd get so mad when I'd look at your drawings. Sometimes I'd do it on purpose because it was the only way I could get you to say a word to me."

It's a hazy and faded memory, but you remember it. It's harder to recall your state of mind, though — the actions, yes, but even in self-retrospect the mind of that five year old boy is impenetrably beyond the realms of logic. Why the hell is she bringing this up now?

"It was so long ago, but I remember it very well. I was about to give up — I was convinced you'd hated me and I was a terrible mother and that I'd have to give you back. I remember it was a really bad day. And then there was a ring at my doorbell, and this — and this skinny little kid, maybe eighteen — I don't know how he found us, but he just showed up. He was dressed so strangely," she says, betraying nothing with her tone. "He told me he was your brother." 

Your blood nearly freezes in your veins. You can see where this is going, but you can't even muster the courage to make a sound. You just stare at her with wide open eyes as she continues to speak.

"I had no way of knowing if he was telling the truth, but I... trusted him. He refused to see you. All he did was ask me questions about how you were doing, and I — I was so desperate, you know? I was so upset and ashamed I couldn't help you. I think I cried. I told him everything because I didn't know what else to do.

"And he told me — you know, you always had those little pointy shades you wore, I could never get you to take them off. He told me to break them. And I did. I stepped on them and made it look like they'd fallen off your dresser and shattered at night," she says, placing her untouched martini onto the ground beside her low sunbathing chair. She seems to have lost the steadiness to hold it. "Two weeks later you called me 'mommy'."

You don't even know what to say.

"I tried to keep in contact with him, but he wouldn't even tell me his name, let alone give me a place to call or send a letter. He'd just show up out of the blue every once in a while, I guess just to ask about you — he'd never let you see him, he would get so angry when I'd tell him he should talk to you — but then he'd be gone just as suddenly. When I knew Mr. Harley was going to be transferring me back to the lab by Rainbow Falls, I didn't even know where to look to tell him where we were going. After we moved to New York, I never saw him again. I always felt guilty about that."

She doesn't meet your eye when she says the words. "But I don't need to worry about that now, do I?"

You gape at her wordlessly. Your mother looks back to you and asks you a more direct question, "Did you know?"

"Y-yeah," is all you can manage to choke out. Why the fuck didn't Dirk tell you that'd he'd _fucking met your mother?_ You would've never fucking brought him here! You'd have never imagined it possible, but at once all the shame of the sex tape seem inconsequential in measure to the intense panic you feel now. No matter how hard you try to calm yourself, your heart won't stop beating a mile a minute and your hands tremor like a leaf. You want to bolt but you can't even will your legs to move.

After you fall back into a silence that's considerably less than comfortable, your mother seems to deem it appropriate to attempt to introduce some levity into the situation. "He's not so skinny anymore," she suggestively comments.

" _Mom,_ " you breathe out. More of _that_ shit certainly isn't helping your anxiety. You allow another pause before you ask a transparently insecure question, "Do you think I'm... weird?"

"Weird? Honey, I am hardly in any position to judge anybody for being _weird._ "

"But having — having sex with my _brother_ is a little... _beyond weird._ "

You don't know how you keep forgetting that your mother is perfect.

"Sweetheart, I don't _give_ a shit," she tells you. "If being with him is what makes you happy, then you should be with him. I know better than anybody that sometimes these things can't be helped, and you gotta be who you are and do what you wanna do. Letting other people make decisions for you about your life and your happiness is only a recipe for disaster, let me tell you. The only person who knows what's good for you is you." 

"I... thanks, I guess," you say. It's almost a weight off your shoulders for someone to know and just not fucking judge you all the same. Your mother doesn't have all the facts, and you doubt she'd say the same if she knew, but it remains something of a relief. 

"You'd really ought to get to sleep, baby," your mother tells you with a long yawn. "I'm about to head back in myself. I just wanted to tell you that."

"Yeah," you say, pulling yourself up out of the chair. You look down at your mother for a moment before you speak again. "I love you, Mom."

She looks back up at you with a warm smile, her eyes crinkled in her age. "I love you too, sweetie."

When you depart from the pool and make your way up the stairs back to your room, you discover that Tupac has taken up your space on the bed. You let loose a deep sigh and make your way over to sit on the bed beside him, and gently stroke along his back to rouse him from his sleep. He doesn't stir, so you try scritching him a little more thoroughly, and then nudge his body gently.

You slowly come to the realization that Tupac is dead.

You leave your palm lain on his side, and sure enough, he's stopped drawing breath. You don't even realize you were holding your own until you pull your hand back.

You scoop the cat's body up in your arms. He's light, even for a cat, and his body is still warm — he can't have passed more than a few minutes ago. You take him out of your bedroom and through the hall and down the stairs, through the living room and kitchen and dining room and to the back door.

When you open up the door to the backyard, you find that your mother seems to have already gone back inside. You don't want to bother her, and it's far too late to wake anybody else up, so you walk through the large yard to the shed and get a shovel.

You don't even know where to bury his body. You wander stupidly through the yard for a while, awkwardly attempting to lug about the shovel and the body of your dead cat at the same time. You don't know anything about this place — when you think of places to lay him down you can only think of your childhood homes. You'd bury him beneath that tree he'd run up and get stuck in dozens of times, or by John's stupid pogo he'd like to curl up on — you'd even have him put in the mausoleum your mother had built when Jaspers died back in New York, if you could. You have no memories here.

There's nothing to be done about that, though. Your house in Washington is long sold, and New York is thousands of miles away. Tupac died here, and you don't want to just... _leave_ him dead until the morning, so you find a spot near the backyard's line of trees, set the cat down and begin to dig. It's much more difficult than you'd thought it would be — the ground is hard and you're very tired. You don't have to dig deep to bury a cat, but it's still more work than you'd expect.

When you've finished a hole of a reasonable size and depth, you toss the shovel aside, wipe your hands on your pants and kneel down to pick back up the cat. You slowly lower his body into the hole, and once he's been laid to rest, you can't manage to do much other than stare. It's so bizarre.

You're not really even upset. Tupac had a long life, much longer than most cats, and you hadn't lived with him in over ten years. It hurts more to think of how you would've felt if he'd died before you'd moved to Los Angeles than it does now; the feeling is so oddly distant and muted, like you'd already mourned his loss long ago. 

So you're okay. Tupac is gone, but he's okay, and you won't miss him. He had the best life a cat could've asked for, and you'll have more than enough to remember him by. You think he was ready to go — he was just holding on to see you one last time. So you're okay.

When you stand back up and retrieve the shovel, you're okay. When you heap the dirt back over his body and pat down the mound of his grave, you're okay. You don't know what to do for a marker, so you just leave the shovel stuck in the dirt by the mound. You'll deal with it in the morning. 

You're okay as you make your way back across the yard and let yourself in to the quiet building. You're okay as you climb the steps to your bedroom, and you're okay when you climb into bed next to Dirk and feel the spot Tupac had left still warm beneath you, even if you can't tell if you're just imagining it.

_You're okay._


	22. Chapter 22

The drive home begins with a tense silence neither of you are eager to break.

"I'm sorry about your cat," Dirk eventually says about halfway through the trip, like he's finally mustered up the nerve to begrudgingly fulfill some sort of obligation by offering you condolences. The words are stilted and utterly empty of any sincerity, but your cat is the last thing on your mind right now.

"You met my mother," you quietly say, your tone carefully constrained. You've spent a lot of time thinking about it but you haven't come up with much of an idea about how to confront him on it, so you stick with being as calm as you can manage.

Dirk doesn't seem to pick up on the implications of your statement. "... Uh." he says, confused. "Is there something notable about that?"

"You'd already _met_ my mother. Years ago."

"Oh," he replies. "Oh. Yeah."

Your grip on the steering wheel of the car becomes uncomfortably tight, your knuckles turned white. "I think it would've been pertinent for me to have known that before I'd invited you to stay," you grit out, trying as best you can to contain your frustration and anger. He makes it so hard.

"I didn't think she would recognize m—"

" _Bullshit,_ " you immediately cut him off. You're shaking a little but you don't take your eyes off the road. "You knew that she'd know and you went on purpose to fucking _out_ me, because you _wanted_ her to know, it wasn't enough for you to have everyone know that you're _fucking me,_ you had to make sure _my fucking mother_ knew _everything_ —"

"Dave, pull over," Dirk sternly commands you, but the force of his tone only exacerbates your anger.

"Fuck you!" you spit, turning your head to direct your furious glare straight at him.

Dirk looks like he's about to crap his pants. " _Holy shit,_ Dave, watch the fucking road — pull over, holy fuck you're going to get us _killed_ —"

You look back ahead just in time to avoid smashing straight into the car ahead of you on the road; you'd slammed the pedal to the floor of the car and blown 30 miles over the limit at some point in your rage. Thankfully, your sense of self-preservation manages to take precedent over your anger and you pull over to take the next exit off the highway.

You drive aimlessly until you find a small park with an empty field, and you put your car into park in the lot with shaking hands. You don't stop to address Dirk, you just wrench open the door to your car and step out into the blaring light of the midday sun. The air around you is cool and calm, but the unshaded sun is hot on your skin. You immediately set into an anxious pattern of pacing, doing your fucking best to shake off the uncontrollable anger and the frustration and your upset, but just _willing_ it to go away isn't an especially fruitful tactic.

Dirk climbs out of the car shortly after you, and stands by helplessly to watch you stew in your turmoil. He stands by the hood of the car, stiff as a statue and guarded as all hell, making no attempt to address you. He simply waits.

"I thought it would be okay," you eventually say, stopping in your tracks to look at him with your brows knit and your mouth set into a frown. You're breathing heavily and all you've done is _walk._ "I was even happy for a while! It went well, it really did!" You're too restless. You have to start pacing again. "But you just — but you can't just _let it be,_ you had to — you had make sure that no matter what, I'd come out of this fucking _miserable_ — you always do — I just —"

Dirk makes a pitiful attempt to defend himself. "I didn't mean for this to —"

" _Yes you did!_ " you shout, throwing your hands up into the air. "You're not fucking dumb, Dirk! No, you're fucking _brilliant!_ You're the smartest fucking man I've ever fucking met and yet you can be such a fucking _moron!_ Do you think I'm fucking _braindead!?!_ "

There's a moment of silence where you stare expectantly at him for an answer and he stares straight back, his face blankly devoid of expression. When he speaks, his voice is even and carefully controlled. "Well, if you've already decided that I did, there's not much I can do to change your mind."

" _Don't make this about me!_ "

Dirk says nothing in return.

Eventually, you realize that this has accomplished nothing and probably never will, so you just get back into the car. Dirk follows you in without a word, and you spend the rest of the ride home in the same silence it began.

 

***

 

When you arrive back at the apartment, you and Dirk go your separate ways near immediately. He makes a beeline for his room and holes himself up in there, and you're pissed enough with him to be thankful for the gesture.

You just want to fucking forget about it all. You head straight for your office and start up your machine, and as soon as you log in you're greeted by a message from Rose. It seems she'd already arrived at home, and found something special waiting there for her.

turntechGodhead [TG] began pestering tentacleTherapist [TT]

TT: I am now holding an 11 inch dog penis dildo.  
TT: Why?   
TG: i had to pay you back for the generous gift you gave me   
TT: Why is it a dog.   
TG: well like  
TG: the point of the dong you sent me was to stand in for the real dong thats ruining my life right  
TG: i was doing the same thing  
TG: like i was implying you have sex with dogs  
TG: its to stand in for the dogs  
TG: that you have sex with  
TG: like hey sis stop fucking dogs  
TG: get it   
TT: I think you need more practice with this.   
TG: yeah in retrospect it wasnt as great an idea as i thought it was   
TT: What am I supposed to do with this thing?  
TT: It's not like I can even use it.  
TT: It's the size of my arm.   
TG: youd be surprised what can fit up there   
TT: For you, maybe.  
TT: Alas, I am cursed by the burden of possessing some degree of elasticity.   
TG: ouch sis  
TG: ice burn   
TT: You're welcome.   
TG: well put it on the mantle or mount it on the wall of the study or something  
TG: it was like 120 dollars it seems like itd be a waste to just throw it out   
TT: In that case, perhaps I should donate it to charity.   
TG: oh yeah thats an awesome idea  
TG: you can save some poor kid from a life of miserable rectal vacancy  
TG: he may not be able to count on a meal every day but at least hell never have to worry about a small anal circumference   
TT: Quite.

You're distracted from your distraction when another pester window pops up onto your screen. You kind of forget about Rose and check out what John has to say.

ectoBiologist [EB] began pestering turntechGodhead [TG]

EB: hey.  
EB: i'm at the airport now, my plane is gonna be here in about half an hour.   
TG: need the big man to entertain you huh   
EB: i just wanted to make sure stuff was cool with us.   
TG: huh  
TG: why wouldnt we be cool   
EB: well, you just acted so weird at christmas.  
EB: about me and vriska, i guess.   
TG: dude  
TG: i have disapproved of like every woman you have ever so much as held hands with  
TG: i think were gonna make it through this one   
EB: yeah, but she's going to be my WIFE.  
EB: that's a little different from you shit talking my other girlfriends.   
TG: haha like that marriage is gonna last longer than 3 months   
EB: ... wow, dude, that was mean even for you.   
TG: ok yeah im sorry that was a bad joke  
TG: i dont even know what youre worried about  
TG: its not like signing a marital document with this broad is gonna make me hate you too  
TG: ive managed to keep the two separate this long i think i can manage even after youve tied the knot   
EB: i just want us to stay friends, i guess.   
TG: of course well always be friends why are you even bringin this up   
EB: because when we weren't friends it was sort of awful and it kinda scares me when i think about being on your bad side again?   
TG: that was so long ago dude  
TG: are you really still upset about the shit i did   
EB: no?  
EB: i mean, i'm over it NOW.  
EB: it was just, um, really bad at the time.  
EB: i don't really want to think about it.  
EB: but this kinda makes me think about it. so.   
TG: come on  
TG: you know none of it was even about you  
TG: i was a little piece of shit teenage asshole  
TG: none of that shit is gonna happen again  
TG: youll always be my sweet bro   
EB: dave...  
EB: that was the gayest thing i've ever heard.   
TG: was that a challenge   
EB: no.  
EB: no, it was not.   
TG: seriously though i love you man  
TG: i just wish youd swap out the harpy girlfriends for a pro dom already this shit is getting old   
EB: it's funny you say that.  
EB: because i... sort of did?   
TG: haha what   
EB: you know how i said vriska and i met while i was doing premed at berkeley?   
TG: yeah   
EB: that... wasn't entirely true.   
TG: ...............   
EB: well.  
EB: it was true but not really the whole truth i guess!   
TG: are you gonna get to the point any time soon   
EB: yeah yeah.  
EB: you remember The Bitch, right.   
TG: i think were going to have to retire that one  
TG: vriska is more than deserving of capital letters  
TG: we cant have The Bitches that would be fucking silly   
EB: dave, shut up.   
TG: ok fine  
TG: yes of course i remember The Bitch how could i forget such a benevolent and selfless soul  
TG: what about her   
EB: this was way back when we broke up and i was all "boo hoo i'm done with girls FOREVER" about it.  
EB: and you kept bitching me out about how it was all my fault for going out with all these "psycho bitches" in the first place.   
TG: oh come on i never said it was all your fault  
TG: just kinda partially your fault for reaching your little pooh bear dick into every big titty bear trap you see   
EB: that was quite possibly the most nonsensical metaphor i have ever heard you make, and i'm including all of your sbahj writing.   
TG: yeah bad comparison vriska is flat as fuck   
EB: i'm just gonna ignore that one.  
EB: anyway, yeah ok, but thats what i took away from it at the time.  
EB: so i was like, beating myself up about it.  
EB: and i was kinda in a bad enough state that i actually took you totally seriously.  
EB: like... including the part where you kept telling me to "fulfill my pathological masochism" by getting a chick to beat me up in the bedroom instead of destroying my life?   
TG: hahaha dude i was just ragging on you   
EB: yes, i realize that.  
EB: but i was going nuts over it.  
EB: my gpa dropped to 3.7!   
TG: wow what a fucking tragedy   
EB: so i... uh.  
EB: put an ad on fetlife?   
TG: hahahahahhahahah  
TG: hahahahahha  
TG: hahaha hahahahahhahh ahha hahaha  
TG: hahahahahhaha   
EB: oh my god, shut up.  
EB: we didn't actually hook up... THROUGH the website.  
EB: she liked to look through those kinds of sites just to laugh at the profiles or whatever.  
EB: or that's what she said anyway, i think in retrospect that probably wasn't true? but uh.  
EB: i mentioned i was going to berkeley in my profile and she recognized me and decided to... make fun of me for it.  
EB: and post copies of my profile around the campus.  
EB: then we started dating for some reason? man, i don't even know how that happened.  
EB: anyway, vriska's pretty cool.   
TG: wait so the first interaction you ever had with her was her publicly humiliating you on purpose  
TG: but shes "pretty cool"   
EB: yeah.  
EB: she doesn't really do that stuff to me anymore.   
TG: "doesnt really"   
EB: uh. she does sometimes when i want her to?  
EB: i don't think that counts though.   
TG: oh my god dude   
EB: anyway, it turned out you were sort of right.  
EB: i mean, APPARENTLY i'm still into "horrible life destroying bitches", but at least i get to have a good time with it.   
TG: well im glad to have helped you discover you like having chicks step on your balls or whatever   
EB: ugh, ballbusting is an entirely different... just. no.  
EB: cock/ball torture is not anywhere even approaching my thing.   
TG: why do you know the name for that  
TG: why does that even have a name   
EB: well, the logical conclusion to draw would be that some guys like having their cock and balls tortured.  
EB: things that happen generally end up getting names!   
TG: you know i think this is way more about your sex life than i ever wanted to know   
EB: well, i didn't want to see you with a dude's enormous fucking dong in your mouth either, so we'll call it even.   
TG: oh my god   
EB: seriously, how does that thing even fit inside of your body?   
TG: john you little shit   
EB: dude, do you poop yourself after you do it? isn't it harder to hold it in after having something so huge up your butt?   
TG: youre lucky youre not within strangling distance right now   
EB: just curious.   
TG: youre just going to be dead if you dont shut the fuck up   
EB: well, lucky for me, they're boarding for first class in like five minutes.  
EB: so i'm gonna take off.   
TG: alright  
TG: good luck man  
TG: try to crash into the ocean and die you overgrown shitweasel   
EB: i'll do my best.  
EB: later.

ectoBiologist [EB] ceased pestering turntechGodhead [TG]

You kind of feel like an idiot.

You more than kind of feel like an idiot, actually. It's legitimately a surprise to you that John has apparently been carrying around so much baggage from all that shit you did to him when he was a kid — you don't know whether you're just an oblivious fucking moron or if you'd just sort of wished it all away in the process of dismissing all of the things your stepfather ever bitched about. It's embarrassing enough to think back on as it is without the knowledge that he's still hauling that shit around with him twenty fucking years later. John never deserved to be the guy you dumped all your impotent teenage mommy issues onto. 

You're not sure whether to be relieved or filled with dread when your stepbrother guilt session is interrupted by a strained set of knocks against your closed office door. You release a small sigh before you tell Dirk to just come in.

"What do you want?" you moodily demand of him when he opens the door and shows his face on the other side. You apparently can't help but ensure that your current displeasure with him is loudly broadcasted.

Dirk already seemed to be plainly aware of it, though, because after an awkward moment of what is effectively a staring competition, Dirk says what is basically the last thing you'd expected to hear out of his mouth now.

"I'm sorry." 

You don't know if he means it, or if he's just trying to tell you what you want to hear — but even the _latter_ is a lot, coming from him. Normally he won't even make the slightest of pretense of actually giving a shit about what you feel, let alone go through all the effort of _lying_ to try to make you feel better. Or maybe assuming that he's doing it to spare your feelings is giving him too much credit — maybe it's just some kind of self-preservation, an attempt to pacify you so you'll keep giving him what he wants.

It's up to you to decide which is going to be your reality, because you know he'll never make it clear.

You look at him for a long while, carefully studying the blankness of his face. You can't even tell what he expects from your answer, or whether the suspense of your silence has any affect on him at all. Predictably, you're left to make the call with no help from him.

"Fuck you," you snap.

There's just a brief pause before Dirk turns and leaves you in your office alone without a word. And despite your better judgment, you immediately regret it.

You don't trust him, and you know you shouldn't trust him — you know you shouldn't even _like_ him — but you _want_ to so badly that you just... give in. You give him the benefit of the doubt for the thousandth time, despite the fact he hasn't earned it, despite the fact you have every reason to believe he's full of shit, because you have this little fantasy world in your head where you can actually be _happy_ and you'll apparently forgive him anything for just a fucking chance to have it.

Not longer after he's closed the door, you rise to your feet and cross the office to step outside yourself. With a sigh, you call back out to him, "Wait."

Dirk stops in his path back to his room, and turns his head to look over his shoulder. As ever, he's careful to wear no notable expression. "What?" he asks, deadpan.

You don't say anything; you don't even know where to start. Instead, you just make your way to the sofa in the middle of the living area and sit down. You release another rattly sigh, rubbling your temple with your eyes downward cast. Aradia hasn't vacuumed in a while.

It's a while before Dirk knows what to do with your complete lack of a response. He eventually settles on tentatively sitting down next to you on the couch, watching you with an expectantly measured look. You look up to him when you feel the cushion of the couch depress next to you.

"You know this is bad," you say.

"I know," he replies.

You look back down to the floor. Unsurprisingly, you don't find any of your answers there.

"I actually like you. I mean, it's stupid that I do and you probably don't even want to hear that since you're a piece of shit, but — you know, I do. I don't want to — fuck, I don't know what I want. I know I don't want whatever the fuck _this_ is. I don't know if we can be any way other than the way that we are but I don't want to — I don't want to _stop_. It's stupid."

"I'm sorry."

"You say you're sorry but what fucking reason do I have to believe it? What reason do you have to _be_ sorry? You don't give a shit about anyone but yourself and you know I won't do anything about it so _why_ —"

"I... don't think things through, all the way. Sometimes."

You laugh.`

" _Sometimes._ "

"Sometimes," he repeats.

You fall back into tepid silence.

"It's not like I... _want_ to hurt you," Dirk starts, his mouth turned into a peculiar frown. "It just sort of happens. Because I'm... well. You know."

"It doesn't just sort of happen. You hurt me because you say and do shit to me that's complete garbage. You could identify that pattern and put a stop to it. It's not that hard."

The expression he gives you is inscrutable. "You're not like me."

"Yes, that much is obvious."

"You're so much different from who I thought you'd be."

"What does that have to do with anything?"

"It shouldn't. I guess."

You look at him and for once just wish he'd be fucking honest with you. But you've learned by now that you just don't get what you want, when it comes to him.

Instead, he kisses you.

You're sort of flabbergasted by the gesture. He's still holding your chin gently in his hand, because he had to wrench your gaze back away from the fucking rug to do it, and you don't know how to react. You wish he'd give you any fucking indication of what he was thinking. He stares at you, eyes hidden, mouth set into an expressionless neutral line. When he leans back in to kiss you again, you at least see it coming, but it's not like that helps you at all.

Is he seriously trying to get you to fuck _now?_ You're angry but more than that you're just fucking _tired._ Just the action disarms you, and drains you of all of the will you had left in you, because what is the god damn fucking point of even trying? 

As it seems with most things, you just let it happen. You close your eyes and raise neither your hand nor voice and tell yourself _it'll be over soon enough._

But he doesn't finish. He doesn't even start.

His lips are pressed to yours, but he doesn't push. You feel his hot breath on your skin and the light touch of his fingers against your jaw and throat, but he doesn't move any further than this.

Perhaps born more of a bizarre curiosity than anything else, you eventually allow your own lips to part. He's quick enough to take the invitation, his fingers curling around the nape of your neck as he pulls your bottom lip between his, but there's an odd chastity to his motions. He doesn't send his tongue immediately probing into the depths of your mouth, or shove his hand straight down your pants, or pull you into his lap to grind his dick into your ass — he just... _kisses_ you. You're not sure whether that in itself, or the fact you find this weird at all, is stranger.

There's a pleasant warmth in your chest you don't think you've felt in a very long time. You feel kind of stupid and dizzy and your frustrations seem like they've gone so far away, and though you know even in the moment that it's dumb you can't help but be overwhelmed by relief. It doesn't change anything, and it certainly doesn't _fix_ anything, but it feels good. It feels like it's enough for now.

It's not, but you feel like it needs to be.

Your hand finds his face and you break apart just long enough for you to take off his shades. He lets you without comment, and after you've set them aside, he offers no complaint when you kiss him back again.

You're not even really hard. You can tell he is, and you can tell even more acutely how much of a struggle it is for him to just _behave_ himself. It almost feels like playing with fire when you press up against him, fist your fingers into his hair and release a quiet moan against his lips.

He has to stop you — but he does stop you. You sit back into your own personal space and you look at him and he looks at you, but neither of you seem to have anything to say. Maybe it's for the best. Talking never seems to work out very well, with the two of you.

When he finally does manage to get something out, it's stilted and hoarse. "I have to take care of something," he says, as if it were any mystery.

You figure you may as well throw him a bone, but it doesn't end up being much of one. You jack him off and it's probably the least sexy J/O you've ever been party to. You're not into it and neither is he, but he gets off and you're left with awkward tension and a sticky hand to show for it. You lick it clean more for convenience's sake than anything, and you notice the taste is substantially less appealing than you remember. You just feel god damn weird.

Dirk puts his dick back into his pants and you don't know where to go from here.


	23. Chapter 23

CA: ok  
CA: get this   
TG: what   
CA: i have like   
TG: what   
CA: hold the fuck on  
CA: like  
CA: FUCK i ran out of toes  
CA: ok  
CA: 28  
CA: i have 28 words for you  
CA: best visual effects   
TG: ... what   
CA: best original score  
CA: best art direction  
CA: best film editing   
TG: wait   
CA: best screenplay   
TG: holy shit   
CA: best sound editing  
CA: best original song   
TG: hahahaha are you fucking serious   
CA: best supporting actor   
TG: yes   
CA: best actor   
TG: hell yes   
CA: best director   
TG: hell fucking yes   
CA: best picture   
TG: HELL  
TG: FUCKING  
TG: YES   
CA: SHIT that was 29 words

 

***

 

"Holy shit, we did even better than last year," you gush. "Eleven fucking nominations. There's no way we're not going to win fucking _something_. My Oscar curse is _done_."

"You were nominated eight times last year and you still didn't win."

"Hey, fuck you, dude."

You're naked and high as fuck and about as happy as you've ever been, though you're not sure that's owed to the nominations, the dick or the weed. Dirk glowers at you from his leisurely reclined position on your bed as you take a long drag from your joint.

New Year's Day came and went, and brought with it an odd contentment. The Moive fucking destroyed on its opening week and you've been coasting along in high spirits ever since. You find yourself thinking from time to time that not too long ago this wouldn't have even been strange to you — but the lack of worry and stress has almost made you counterproductively harried and defensive about your own happiness. Like you're just fucking waiting for the moment where it's all going to go to shit because just not feeling like a huge pile of human trash all of the time is some sort of cosmic prank, building you up to tear you down.

You're not thinking about that right now, though. Right now, you have the fuckin' ganja and that's all you need.

You discard the roach of your thoroughly smoked joint carelessly onto your bedside table and roll over to drape yourself over Dirk, who immediately bristles and recoils. You laugh at him as he complains about how bad you smell.

"Gonna be a year, at the ceremony," you listlessly comment, burying your face into the crook of Dirk's neck. Despite his protests, he's made no effort to push your dead weight off of him. You close your eyes and inhale. He smells nice.

"What?"

"Well. Almost. Last year's was the day after, technically. The 27th. When we met. So our year will be like... the day after this year. But shit, just round that garbage up."

"We met a hell of a long time before last year," Dirk gruffly corrects you. Shithead.

You yawn sleepily. "That doesn't count, cocks-for-brains." You open your eyes and find it hard to keep them that way. "You should come with me this time."

Dirk slightly shifts to look at you. "What, in public?"

"Mm."

"Didn't expect you'd be up for that."

You let your eyelids flutter shut again. "Who the fuck even cares?"

If he had an answer, you don't hear it; you drift off to a peaceful sleep.

 

***

 

You're not sure if you regret it in the morning or not.

There are many logistical problems your weed-addled brain hadn't factored in to your invitation: namely, convincing Dirk to go along with getting a proper tuxedo tailored, and _dis_ inviting your mother. You don't know which seems the more daunting task.

As usual, Dirk is absent from your bed when you wake; you decide to go with the option that doesn't involve actually getting out of bed. You lazily reach over to grapple your phone off the bedside table, and thumb open your Pesterchum app. Here's for another round of avoiding stressful phone conversations you don't want to have.

turntechGodhead [TG] began pestering tipsyGnostalgic [TG]

TG: hey mom  
TG: are you there   
TG: YES!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!   
TG: uh  
TG: hi   
TG: hey honeybunch :))  
TG: im so excite!!! u got so many nomz this year  
TG: i am so proud of you  
TG: i cantr wait !!!! my little boy id gonna get a oscar omg  
TG: it is DEF going to happen this year, i know it   
TG: yeah haha  
TG: about the oscars   
TG: ??   
TG: would you be ok if i took dirk as my +1 this year  
TG: instead of you   
TG: ?????/?  
TG: UMMMMMMMMMMMMMM  
TG: baby excuse me but i dont thinbk that you understand the forces at play here  
TG: i HAVE  
TG: just absolulyetly *********HAVE********* to be there  
TG: i pretty much promsised maddona i would be there  
TG: r u tellin me that i gotta break my promise to MODONNA  
TG: *MODONNA   
TG: dude you and madonna are fucking besties or whatever youve sucked face so many times  
TG: just ask her to get you your own invite to vanity fair   
TG: or u could just take me like alsways!!! >:(   
TG: youre never even conscious during the oscar ceremony itself  
TG: and im probably not even going to go to vanity fair this year  
TG: elton john gave me like 10k to go to his party instead   
TG: WHAT   
TG: it wasnt like  
TG: a bribe  
TG: he just kinda  
TG: slipped me a "donation"  
TG: then suggested he hoped to see me at his after party this year  
TG: ok it was basically a bribe   
TG: smdh  
TG: well why dont you just ask the academy to give you more +1s   
TG: i could  
TG: but i dont  
TG: want to   
TG: dave  
TG: is what you are saying to me here that you do not want to take 5 mins out of your day to make a phone call on behalf of yor bueatuiful darling mother  
TG: your mother who fed and raised u all these years  
TG: gave u a home and more love then any child could ever hope for  
TG: after a full twenty eight years of unwavevering devotion 2 to her most precious sons care and devlopment  
TG: is that the thing that u are saying to me in this time & place   
TG: yes   
TG: siiiiiiiiihn  
TG: ok ill call madonna dna ask her 2 give me an ivite :/  
TG: youre stepfather is going to have to drive me :/   
TG: ok cool   
TG: :/   
TG: what are you :/ing about   
TG: just lettin u known i am v sad & disapoipted  
TG: that i raised a little boy who doesnt understand teh value of family  
TG: :/   
TG: uhhh  
TG: did you think about that one because  
TG: not sure that applies either way mom   
TG: oh wait yea  
TG: i forgot  
TG: w/e i need to go out to buy some more vagisil ill talk to u later sweetheart :)   
TG: really could have lived without knowing that   
TG: ull understand when ur older bby   
TG: bye mom   
TG: bye bye xoxoxoxoxo!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

tipsyGnostalgic [TG] ceased pestering turntechGodhead [TG]

You close the fuck out of Pesterchum and turn your phone completely off. You are very ready to be done with all of that.

You almost wish your mother had put up more of a fight, though. Maybe an excuse to get out of this incredibly shitty idea would have been worth it.

With a sigh, you drop your brick of a phone back off onto the bedside table and haul yourself out of bed. You begin an internal debate about whether you want to procrastinate with a shower or just get it all over with now, but the question is solved for you when Dirk wanders back into your room.

"You're awake," Dirk astutely observes, stood in the doorway of your bedroom.

"Uh, yeah," you confirm. "Was just about to go look for you. We need to go to —" You pause. Maybe there's still a chance you can bail out. "I wanted to talk about what I said last night."

Dirk's expression immediately turns to a condescending sourness, and he punctuates his response with a roll of his eyes. "Don't worry, I knew you were talking out of your weed-addled ass."

Shit. Now you look like the asshole. You groan and change course. "That's not what I meant. I wanted to know if _you_ really wanted to go. You don't have to if you don't want to."

You can tell straight off that this isn't going to work either. The moment the question leaves your mouth, you can see the gears turning in Dirk's head as he attempts to formulate a way to say that he wants to go without actually expressing any genuine desire to do so. "It's not like I have anything better to do that day," he settles on with a calculatedly half-hearted shrug.

"If you're really coming with me then we're going to have to go to a real tailor and get you something proper to wear."

Dirk sneers. Maybe you have a chance yet! "I just got a damn suit, why do I need another one?"

"That was a regular suit. The Academy Awards are black tie, you'll need a tuxedo. Plus that thing wasn't custom tailored, it _barely_ fit you well enough to be passable for a mid-scale restaurant, I'm not taking you in front of national television in a suit that doesn't —"

"Jesus Christ —"

"If you aren't willing to look presentable, I don't have to take you," you say, jumping on the opportunity, but you instantly regret it. You were too eager, your voice too sharp — he takes it as a challenge and you know then that you've lost.

"Fine."

Shit shit shit shit shit. You're committed now. There's no turning back. It just now hits you how entirely unready for this you are.

You wish you weren't too fucking much of a coward to just admit you're a coward.

 

***

 

You suppose your trip to your usual tailor is something of a test run.

You've had dinner with him and his wife a couple of times, but you can't say you're that well acquainted with him. You certainly don't know the first thing about his political opinions. He's in just that perfect spot where you'd probably give a shit if he reacted negatively, but you don't have even the faintest idea as to what he might think. You haven't even spoken to him since your little leak issue. It's a good sign that he called you back at all, right?

The drive over to the tailor's studio is bizarrely nervous. If you're this on edge about the opinion of some dude you don't really even know, how the fuck are you going to handle the scrutiny of the fucking millions of people who tune in to the Oscars? It's not like there's anybody left on the planet who still doesn't know you're a huge queer, but somehow you can't imagine there being anything but a media frenzy over your first public outing with The Dude Everyone Saw You Blow.

You'd give in to your cold feet if you didn't know it would piss off Dirk and ruin the incredibly tenuous illusion of concordance you've managed to sustain over the past few weeks. You like not wanting to murder your boyfriend on a regular basis. Maybe the temporary stress will be worth it in the long run — that's what you're telling yourself, at least. You're not sure it's helping at all.

Either way, you're getting this shithead a proper tux — and maybe a suit or two while you're at it. He needs them, anyway, Oscars or no — what if somebody _dies_? You're not taking him to a funeral in a fucking polo. You push your worries to the back of your mind the best you can manage as you put your car in park in front of the building.

The expression you catch from Dirk as you both step out of the car is less than enthusiastic, but in an effort to keep the peace, you refrain from making any comments. While he's certainly not willing to look happy about it, he's going along with it, which you suppose is the most you can ask. He could be doing a lot worse.

You hurriedly make your way into the building; whichever way this goes, you're certainly not ready for paparazzi shots. Dirk trails behind you at a considerably more leisurely pace, but thankfully nothing comes of it.

The inside of the shop is a small and intimate affair; there is a very small selection of premade suits on the racks — every one of them prohibitively expensive — but none of them are for anything more than show. No one with the money to drop on this guy's suits is shelling out for anything but the absolute best, which means outrageously expensive formalwear made to custom specification. His wife runs the business with him; she's sat behind the small desk off to the side of the shop and greets you with a broad grin upon your arrival.

"Dave! It's so good to see you," she says, rising from her chair. She has large breasts and a low cut dress, and you are not a man blessed with that much willpower.

And Dirk notices. The air about him turns to frost and you hope that she doesn't pick up on the deathly glare he has hidden behind his shades. 

"Hi Vivienne," you timidly greet her, relocating your eyes to a less dangerous place. "I have an appointment with Giancarlo. Your husband. Whom you are married to."

That earns you a bit of a strange look, but she doesn't question either you or Dirk. "Ah, yes. You can go ahead to the back whenever you're ready."

You have to elbow Dirk in the ribs to get him to stop shooting her dirty looks. After very barely dodging his attempted retaliation, you hurry along to the back of the shop and hope that Dirk has decided to stop being a shit.

You step through the light set of drapes that cover the door to enter the tailoring room. When your footsteps sound through the small, tidy back area, the man stood by the work table towards the center looks up to greet you; his welcoming smile falters slightly when Dirk follows in behind you.

You... sort of neglected to mention that the tailoring was not being done for _you_.

"Good afternoon, Dave," he says, with a curious tone. Giancarlo is probably the most stereotypical Italian man you've ever met who wasn't part of the mob, dressed to kill with immaculately styled salt-and-pepper hair and a bit of an accent. He makes homemade pizza and gelato and you're not sure he's real sometimes.

"Uh, hey," you awkwardly greet him, shoving your hands in your pockets. "So, um..."

Wow. You really did not think this through at all. As your social paralysis gives way to uncomfortable silence, you find yourself wishing to be dead. Or, at the very least, not here. Why are you so fucking stupid?

You're a little surprised when Dirk is the one to speak in compensation for your mortified paralysis. "I need a suit," he gruffly supplies. 

"Well. Yes. Of course," Giancarlo replies. You're not sure whether his awkward discomfort is due to your failure to supply any information as to what you wanted here, from his knowledge of your relationship with Dirk, or the basic contagion of your own social ineptitude. None of these options put you any more at ease.

You open and close your mouth a couple of times before your tailor eventually decides to put you out of your misery. "Then — well —" He looks to Dirk. "If you'll just step this way, we can get started with your measurements?"

 

***

 

"What the fuck was wrong with you back there?" Dirk asks you as you're leaving the shop, bristling with hostility. You immediately take the defensive.

"I'm just — I'm just nervous, all right? Not a fucking crime."

"Sure, whatever, but it was fucking fine. You could have eased up at any point past the first thirty goddamn seconds. You didn't have to stand there like a petrified child the entire time. I don't get you."

What is even the fucking point of engaging? You huff in exasperation and hurry up so you don't have to put up with walking in step with him.

"Stop," Dirk calls out from behind you. You speed up. You can see your car now; you don't know what good it's going to do you once you get there, but for now, it's a start. Dirk repeats himself and you continue to ignore him.

You have no idea what you were hoping to accomplish. You reach your car and unlock it with your fob, but as you reach for the handle of the driver side door you find your arms being pulled behind your back — right before you're bodily shoved against the side of your car.

"Dirk — what — what the _fuck!?_ " you snarl, twisting with futility in his grasp. He looks like he's trying to fucking arrest you. There's a woman walking her dog on the sidewalk nearby who stares at you and stops — probably takes a second to realize who you are — and then begins to scramble slackjawed for her phone. _Shit_.

Luckily for you, she doesn't have the time to take a picture before Dirk wrenches open the door to the back seat and throws you inside, shrouded by the safety of your heavily tinted windows. You swear and kick at him wildly as he climbs inside behind you, but he ignores you, and an unpleasant sensation akin to fear pools in your stomach when he easily overcomes you. "Stop it," he repeats, over and over and over again, but you keep struggling. _You don't want this. You don't want it. You don't want it._

What don't you want, exactly?

You don't really know. Dirk holds you down until the fit passes, until you accept that you're achieving nothing by fighting him. You sit in silence for a while. When Dirk pulls back, you realize how hard it was to breathe with his weight on top of you and take in the lungful of air you sorely needed.

"You done, now?" Dirk asks you, expression blank.

You exhale.

"Yeah."

 

***

 

You wonder if that even happened.

You worried for a while if that was it, the snap that would send you back to an ugly relationship of bickering and fighting and unpleasantness — but the moment you get home, Dirk seems content to act as if nothing had ever happened. You're not sure if it's because he's as sick of it as you are and he's pretending just to keep the peace, or that he honestly didn't recognize anything as having changed. 

Either way, you feel like you're supposed to take his cue. So you act like nothing did happen, and when he kisses you you kiss him back, and when he fucks you you let him, and before long you've forgotten what you were even mad about yet again. You're not sure you knew in the first place.

"If it's that big of a deal, I don't have to go," Dirk tells you one night, apropos of nothing. You thought you'd be happy for the out, but you hesitate even in that.

"I don't want it to be a big deal, though," you say with a sigh. He gently touches your face and you flinch. 

His voice is soft. "If it's a big deal, it's a big deal."

"But —"

"Just, think about it," he tells you. "I'm not gonna give a shit if you back out. Not really. If you think you're doing this just so I won't be pissed, or whatever, just stop it. I don't care. Do what you actually wanna do. Rather not go than have this fuck everything up."

"... All right," you breathe. It's a weight off, even if only to not have to make the decision now.

You have to at least follow suit on the suit, though. Dirk is less than pleased to be informed of this.

"Jesus, cut me a break," he grouses. You're glad you can at least still find some humor in his expense. 

"You need some proper formalwear no matter what we end up doing, dude. Come on."

"Just let me die already."

You hadn't realized just how much of the stress was in the pressure of Dirk's expectations until you walk back into the tailor shop with a pretense of none. You can't even conceive of being as nervous as you were the last time, now. There's a bit of discomfort — you don't think that's ever going to go away — but you don't feel like you're drowning any more. You find you don't really give that much of a shit about what Giancarlo thinks after all. Reflecting on your prior behavior just amounts to embarrassment.

You learn to stop reflecting.

Giancarlo is certainly a fast worker; by the time you've returned he already has all three of the suits you've ordered prepared, and all that's left to do is for Dirk to try them on to be sure no more alterations need to be made.

There's a little fitting room in the shop and Dirk begrudgingly takes the articles to try them on. Eternally inundated with orders, Giancarlo returns to his table to resume whatever brief measure of work he can manage in the time it takes Dirk to change into the first of the set.

"You look really good," you breathe when Dirk finally emerges from the minuscule fitting room in the tuxedo, and he does. His closet is entirely filled with outfits premised entirely on looking like an asshole — you don't think you've ever seen him wear anything that wasn't ridiculous, or fit him like a boat. Of course, you have always held the opinion that a good suit looks good on any man, but for Dirk, doubly so.

"I look ridiculous," Dirk complains.

His bowtie is just a little bit off, but you're surprised he even knows how to tie one as well as he managed. You step a bit closer to him and reach up to adjust it. He seems to grow a little flustered as you look upon him fondly. "No you don't."

There's a moment of what you're sure is, for him, awkward silence, before Dirk attempts to redirect the attention away from himself. "Do you have a boner?"

You look down. _Huh._ "Guess I do," you remark. Weird.

It takes a moment for you to recall that the tailor is standing right there, and can hear you. He clears his throat. As sensation akin to ice water rushes over you; this at least has the benefit of quelling whatever beginnings of vascular activity you may have been sporting.

"Looks all right," the tailor succinctly observes, deftly evading the subject of your erection. You're forced to allow your heart to stop beating in your throat when he returns to his work table and makes no further comment. Dirk gives you the smarmiest _I told you so_ look imaginable and you just barely push down the urge to punch him in the nuts.

You give Dirk a closer look over, and you can't find any fault in the tux either. It's about as perfect as perfect can get. You make him spin around until he finally realizes you're fucking with him and returns to the changing room in a huff. 

 

***

 

TT: Are you sure you know what you're doing?   
TG: if i only did things when i knew what i was doing id never do anything   
TT: Dave.   
TG: ugh   
TT: Are you even prepared to make this sort of commitment?   
TG: commitment to what  
TG: its not like taking him out in public means im going to be fucking married to him   
TT: While I have no doubt of your capacity to do things like this on a whim, I also know you know this is a bigger deal for you than you're making it out to be.   
TG: its been a lot better lately  
TG: i think hes at least started to realize that were fucked up  
TG: and i dont think he actually wants us to be fucked up any more than i do  
TG: so   
TT: So what?  
TT: Do you feel like you're obligated to reward him for putting a modicum of effort into being a decent human being?   
TG: what  
TG: no  
TG: i mean  
TG: i guess part of it is that i know he doesnt like how im like  
TG: kind of ashamed of him   
TT: He has certainly given you plenty of reasons to be.   
TG: i know  
TG: but i dont want to be  
TG: i know id be happier too if i could just not give a shit  
TG: it isnt just about him   
TT: But you know that "just not giving a shit" isn't that simple.   
TG: yeah  
TG: but i want to try anyway  
TG: just fucking cauterize the wound or whatever   
TT: And how did that work out for you the first time?   
TG: what   
TT: You know, with him leaking a sex tape to force you to publicly acknowledge him.   
TG: dirk didnt do that   
TT: Dave, we've been over this.   
TG: whatever  
TG: i dont want to have this fucking argument again  
TG: and you know what i did feel fucking better after that happened  
TG: id been lying about myself to basically everybody forever and it was stupid so why not fucking go all the way  
TG: if everything is out in the open what do i even have left to be ashamed of   
TT: But you can't have everything out in the open.   
TG: who is even going to know about that  
TG: how the fuck would anyone find out   
TT: Maybe no one will.  
TT: But the statistical probability of it aside, I know it's always going to weigh on you.  
TT: And this is going to make it that much harder to pull back when you've decided that it's too much for you after all.   
TG: god  
TG: all i fucking want is to not to have to feel shitty all of the time because im banging a dude   
TT: And I'm sure achieving that would be possible, with literally any other man on the face of the planet besides him.   
TG: ugh  
TG: but i dont want to be with somebody else   
TT: Then be with nobody?   
TG: thatd be even worse   
TT: Dave, you cannot actually be this pathetic.  
TT: This is not your first horrible toxic relationship, and it probably won't be your last.  
TT: You will move on with your life just like the last time.   
TG: or instead of giving up i could just try to make this not suck   
TT: You've been trying to make this not suck for an entire year now.  
TT: When are you going to take the hint?  
TT: Human beings are not projects.  
TT: You can't fix him.  
TT: Maybe you can fix yourself, but not under these circumstances.   
TG: jesus dick  
TG: youre making me sound like a romcom protagonist   
TT: That's because you are, Dave.  
TT: You believe you're his manic pixie dream girl come to heal his dark and broken soul and teach him how to love again.   
TG: what  
TG: no  
TG: holy shit no   
TT: You know it's true.   
TG: what the fuck no  
TG: i am so impossibly finished with this miserable conversation  
TG: why do i even talk to you  
TG: you are fucking terrible   
TT: If that's the case, I'm surprised you're not trying to date me instead.   
TG: and just when i thought this couldn't get any more awful than it already was   
TT: Seriously,  
TT: Just think about it.  
TT: You still have time to back out.   
TG: ive done next to nothing but think about it for the past month and no i really dont  
TG: i have to go  
TG: right now  
TG: also just fyi if you dont watch me get an oscar im disowning you, bye

turntechGodhead [TG] ceased pestering tentacleTherapist [TT]

You summarily close out of your Pesterchum client with a sigh and prepare to face the final culmination of so many days spent pants-shitting.

Particularly concerned with your image tonight, you summon Aradia into your apartment in a fit of insecurity and recruit her to criticize your wardrobe. You narrowed your selection down to half a dozen night-identical suits and Aradia puts you out of your misery by, you can only assume, picking one at complete random.

"Are you sure you don't want me to come with you?" Aradia asks as she puts on the final touch of fastening one of your unusually uncooperative cufflinks.

"It'll be fine," you assure her, however unsure you actually are.

"I could always just stay in the car and wait for you in case you need me."

"Aradia," you breathe, reaching out to gently grip her by the shoulder. She cocks her head to the side in a bizarrely dog-like fashion. "Really. Seriously. Got a mom, don't need another one," you say, despite the fact you literally just required her to dress you. "Relax. I will be completely and perfectly okay without you to hold my hand through the ceremony. Probably."

"If you say so."

"I say so," you say, slipping on your shades. You are in for one hell of a night.

Aradia reluctantly returns to her apartment once she's accepted that there's nothing left for her to do, and you head over to Dirk's room to check on his preparatory process. Unless you get a move on soon, you're going to be late.

You find Dirk angrily picking through the festering sty that is his room; the floor is strewn with miscellaneous articles of clothing which he appears to have undertaken the effort of meticulously upturning in search of something. "Ugh," you grouse; you're not exactly the tidiest person on the planet, but Dirk manages to bring disarray to a new level. "Why don't you just pick that shit up instead of throwing it right back on the ground? When's the last time you did laundry?"

"Because it's easier," he grunts. "And I don't know, when did Aradia finally stop breaking into my room to wash all my shit?"

"Jesus Christ, dude. How the fuck is this easier? There is no sense to any god damn thing happening in this room."

"What? No, this makes perfect sense. I don't need to wash everything after only wearing it once, that's fucking wasteful, except for underwear. Look, shit that's clean goes in the closet and the dresser. Shit that's dirty goes in the laundry basket," he says, gesturing to said basket. It doesn't seem to have much in it _apart_ from underwear. How does this guy shower eight times a day and stay chill with dirty shirts? "Shit that I've worn once or a couple times goes on the floor. Sniff test, if it's good, floor. This way I'm not messing it up with stuff that's actually dirty, and it's easier to find when it's all spread out like this."

"Evidently not, since I've been standing here for like ten minutes watching you not be able to find fucking anything down there."

Dirk looks at you like _you're_ stupid.

You roll your eyes and simply join in on tossing stuff on the floor about. It only occurs to you after another several minutes to ascertain what exactly it is he's actually fucking looking for.

"I can't find that fucking piece of shit bowtie you bought," he explains. He's all dressed, apart from one — you're surprised he even managed to get this far on his own without you hassling him about it.

"Dude, I have a minimum of eighty goddamn seven bowties," you exhale, lifting up your shades to rub at your face in exasperation. "Come on, just borrow one of mine."

"But I _know_ this fucking thing was here and it's pissing me off and —"

"Is it in your pocket?"

Dirk stops and stares at you, before slowly reaching his hand into his pants pocket. You can tell immediately what he's found from the comically furious look that spreads onto his face. "Mother _fucker,_ how did I — I swear to _piss Christ_ —"

You sigh and step forward to take the strip of cloth from his clenched fist. He rolls his eyes as you make quick work of tying it around his neck; once you're done, you adjust it neatly, straighten his shirt and button his jacket closed. You pull back to get a look at him, and after a terse moment of silence, you pull him into a hug.

"What the fuck is this about?" Dirk snidely responds to your sudden desire for intimacy, but, of course, he doesn't bother to push you away. 

You shrug, breathing in the scent of his shirt. It's very new, and doesn't smell like him yet. "Reminding myself why I'm doing this."

Dirk doesn't seem to know what to say to that. 

You pull away after a while and look up at his face. He's already got his shades on, impenetrable as ever. You feel a bit strange, but you have trouble placing why. You brush it off. "Driver's already here. Probably, that fucker is always early. We should probably get going."

"Yeah."

 

***

 

Jade used to say that you lived for the red carpet.

You have to admit there's an appeal to the rush — to the roar of the crowd, the frenzied flashing of lights — but tonight you found yourself in nervous anticipation of what might otherwise have been attention whore revelry. As the clock counted down, you began to worry about whether or not you could even hold character for the duration of the show.

Everything changes the moment you step out of the car. 

Sometimes you forget just how much of a transformation it really is, between yourself and the assumption of your legend. When you see that teenage girl with ridiculous braces and a marriage proposal sign dedicated to you, suddenly failure is not an option.

Your posture straightens. Your mouth solidifies into an emotionless line. You don't smile, you don't frown, you don't give any indication that you're anything but the smoothest motherfucker in this joint because you _absolutely fucking are._

Dirk follows your cue and you can't even tell if anyone gives a shit if he's there because you don't fucking care. You do a customary amount of photoshoots and you blow off enough reporters to keep yourself interesting, and then you set about accomplishing the bare minimum of social interaction necessary to not be a complete shitlord. You find your mother milling about on the red carpet on Madonna's arm, but when you discover she is already drunk to the point of incoherence, you deftly avoid the confrontation — and after you give Ben, Owen and Donald the briefest greetings you can manage (all of whom seem to be surprised by the presence of Dirk, but smart enough not to comment), you file into the theatre and leave it all behind.

"So this is that Dave Lalonde I've heard so much about," Dirk snidely remarks, but you can tell he's almost _proud. Congratulations on managing to be a tenth of the irreverent prick I am all the time normally!_

You roll your eyes and don't care if he catches it. After inquiring after your seating assignments for this year, you lead Dirk along to the main body of the theatre and begin the long descent down to the front rows. You notice quite a few heads turning as you walk past the aisles but you keep your chin high and look straight ahead at your destination.

Which, as you draw closer, appears to be occupied by a rather unfortunate sight. You are stricken by a particularly malicious strain of deja-vu.

You reach your seat — close to the aisle, but not quite on the edge — and confirm that it is indeed correct. Your first impulse is to assume that this was a mistake. Your second impulse is to shoot yourself in the face when Karkat Vantas finally notices that you're standing right beside him.

"What the FUCK do you want?" he spits as he turns on a dime, eyes comically bulging out of his ridiculous skull. Terezi — who is evidently his guest this year, dressed in a blindingly hideous gown that vaguely resembles what you imagine Jackson Pollock would produce if he were a fashion designer, had unlimited access to mushrooms and only five minutes to spend in MS Paint — is clearly much happier to see you, giving you an energetic wave and a "Hi Dave!" that's inevitably drowned out by another round of Karkat's unintelligible invective bile.

"Why the _fuck_ do we keep being assigned to sit next to each other?" you complain; it seems as if you and Karkat have finally found solidarity in your mutual disdain. The look he wears on his face is almost as nasty as yours. 

"They — WHAT — how could they do — I'm going to complain. To somebody!" he yells, gesticulating like a madman. "They did this on purpose!!!"

"Yeah. Not a doubt in my mind that the thing that is transpiring here is a conspiracy solely dedicated to ensuring that I have to spend my time around Earth's most contemptible sewer rat."

Dirk gets to enjoy a rare moment of being the one embarrassed by _you,_ and Terezi looks decidedly uncomfortable.

"Karkat, don't make a scene," Pyrope scolds him before he has a chance to respond with an even more disparaging tirade. Her chiding words almost seem to mollify him — at least until he sees the haughty grin on your face you got from having his own damn girlfriend defend you. That just makes him fly back into a twofold rage.

"No! No, I'm not going to just lay down and let some fucked up Academy anus prince defecate all over my integrity for his own twisted entertainment!! I can't believe this, this -- I mean -- our movies are both nominated for best screenplay and best director and best picture, this is — this _has_ to be against policy, we're going to be in the same camera shot when I win — and that's going to be _miserably_ humiliating for you, I'm sure!! No, wait, no. Just fucking kill me! I'm sure that would be better than having to suffer another single hour on this Earth within earshot of the useless shit-cum amalgam that is perpetually gushing from the battered fuck-hole you call a 'mouth', and might I add also that additionally --"

The other attendees nearby are starting to catch onto the spectacle; Dirk seems to reach the end of his rope quickly enough. This doesn't seem to be the kind of scrutiny he signed up for.

You manage to restrain your shock when Dirk forcefully grips Karkat by the back of the neck and pulls him closer to growl something into his ear you don't quite catch. What you definitely are privy to, however, is how all of the color in Karkat's face drains nigh instantaneously. When Karkat very quickly drops the issue and settles into his seat, Terezi doesn't seem to know whether to be offended on Karkat's behalf or thankful.

Your seating arrangements seem to have conspired to sit Terezi and you together, which you're not sure is particularly wise — but for the time being, Karkat doesn't seem inclined to complain given the looming spectre of your ridiculously threatening boyfriend. It looks like the production is just about ramping up to go live, anyway.

Terezi appears to have a sudden realization. "... Wait, who's this guy?" she asks, looking around you to Dirk. Dirk makes a show of being mildly irritated.

"Dirk," he succinctly replies.

"He's the guy I blew in that video," you clarify.

"Ohhhh!" Terezi exclaims, an unsettling rictus overtaking her face. "Nice dick."

A disgruntled noise erupts from Karkat's seat. Dirk nods solemnly. "Thanks."

Thankfully, that unpleasant line of conversation is cut short by the beginning of the ceremony. First on to present the awards after Billy Crystal's awkward opening skit is Tom Hanks, who starts out with a category only Karkat's shitty film, Venus in Blue, is nominated for — best cinematography — so you sit back and watch with anxious impatience for the winner to be announced. You enjoy a private moment of schadenfreude when the Oscar goes to Hugo, but your revelry in Karkat's disappointment is cut short when best art direction is up immediately next.

It seems karma is a swift bitch, because fucking Hugo takes that one too.

"God dammit," you curse when the production goes to commercial. You specifically avoid looking for Karkat's response because you're sure it's every bit as vindictive as yours was.

"Your movie was nominated eleven times," Terezi attempts to reassure you with a shrug. "I'm sure you'll get something."

You groan. "Maybe, but this isn't the most encouraging start."

After only two categories, the program cuts to its first commercial break — you're always restless during the intermissions.

"I have to piss," Dirk announces abruptly.

"Why didn't you piss before we left?" you ask, allowing a carefully moderated amount of irritation seep into your voice.

"I did."

"Well, go while it's still in commercial."

So Dirk goes. And stays gone, well into the resumption of the program. A seat filler is quick to assume Dirk's vacancy; he smells really bad but he's doing such a good job of ignoring your existence that you don't want to chance it by engaging him and giving him implicit license to talk at you forever.

And it's just as well, because there's fucking nothing you're nominated for in all of the upcoming presentations. Every time a new celebrity steps on stage your heart leaps into your throat and then crashes right back down when it has nothing to do with you or your movie. 

You just about tune out everything until Christian Bale comes out to present, for which you allow yourself an offhand remark.

"Christian Bale is fucking hot," you mention sideways to Terezi, who immediately responds with a shrieking cackle.

"Hell yes," she says, grasping your hand in solidarity. "I'd wreck that."

With Dirk gone, Karkat seems to have relocated his testicles. Ever the contrarian, you can hear the sneer in his voice without having to look at him. "He's not _that_ ho— _WHY ARE YOU TOUCHING?_ "

You actually do bother to look at Karkat this time — you're kind of worried his eyeballs are going to burst out of his sockets. Which is to say, that's what you hope happens. Failing your ability to actualize that, you settle for feigning lack of awareness of what was going on, looking to your and Terezi's hands in fake surprise. "Oh, sorry," you say, withdrawing your hand; you give Karkat just as many seconds as he needs to relax before stretching your arm up and around Terezi's shoulders.

Terezi just laughs; you're starting to suspect she enjoys fucking with Karkat almost as much as you do. Karkat opens his mouth to scream, but the words seem to die in his throat — you turn your head to ascertain the source of his apprehension.

Dirk looks to you, and then to Terezi, and your arm around her — you're worried he's about to make a scene, until he looks to Karkat and everything seems to click into place. _Well, at least he understands how fucking with people works._ Karkat doesn't have another word to say, apparently, but from his facial expression it looks like he's passing kidney stones.

"What the hell took you so long?" you hiss at Dirk when he finally kicks the seat filler out and resumes his place. You were starting to worry that he'd run out on you.

"I lied. I had to take a shit," he informs you emotionlessly.

"You were gone for like half an hour."

"Like to take a long shit."

You don't even know what to say to that. You choose not to say anything to that. 

It only occurs to you that you'd just about completely checked out from the ceremony when the program cuts to commercial again and you realize you have no idea what that category just was or who won it.

"Octavia Spencer for best supporting actress," Terezi helpfully replies when you convey your confusion. "Did you really miss it??"

"I... guess."

You figure you should probably not be posed with your arm around another dude's lady in the event that a category you're nominated in comes up and demands your appearance on camera, so you smoothly transition into a more acceptable position; you hazard a glance at Karkat when you do, and he seems to make some sort of attempt at intimidation.

"If you so mu—"

His poor effort dies in the cradle when Dirk nigh instantaneously cuts him off. "What did I _fucking_ say, kid?"

The speed with which Karkat deflates is so alarming as to be comical. He opens and closes his mouth and, finally, shrinks back into his seat in defeat.

"What the _fuck_ did you say to him?" you ask Dirk incredulously in a low voice; he only gives you a coy shrug.

The next category you're finally up for comes in right after the commercial break — Tina Fey and Bradley Cooper are out to present, and it's another category Karkat's shitty film is also in the running for. Tonight, it seems you're more concerned with Karkat _losing_ than you are with your own film getting anything.

You're relieved to see film editing go to The Girl with the Dragon Tattoo and not Karkat, though you're significantly more disappointed when fucking Hugo beats you out _again_ for sound editing. The sound editing in The Moive was fucking masterful, what the fuck?

Terezi seems to detect your dour mood and leans over to pose a lewd question. "Which one would you rather bang?"

"Tina Fey," you immediately respond. It's not that Bradley Cooper is _un_ attractive, but — Tina Fey. "Is it weird that I really want to fuck her while she's dressed up as Sarah Palin?" you ask. "Like, doing the character too."

"Oh, no, me too," Terezi says. She seems to make a misguided attempt to include Dirk in the conversation, looking to him with earnest interest. "How about you?"

"Not into pussy," Dirk curtly replies.

"What? Not even Tina Fey's pussy?"

"No."

"What if she had a dick?"

"Maybe."

Another frustrating commercial break starts up, but when it and the obligatory appearance of muppets have passed, the audience is treated to a substantially more entertaining performance by Cirque Du Soleil. You never got to see Cirque Du Soleil due to your stepfather being banned for reasons he'd never explain, so you are fairly impressed. A guy takes off his shirt for no reason and you're pretty all right with it. Some nice upskirts. It's cool.

Once the dancing clowns are good and done and the program transitions back into the standard presentation, you and Terezi resume your juvenile _hot or not_ exercise.

"Gwenyth Paltrow or Robert Downey Jr.?" Terezi asks.

"I'd let Downey shit on me if he asked, honestly," you say; Terezi nods in solemn agreement.

"Same," Dirk contributes.

"What about Chris Rock? Would you fuck Chris Rock," you inquire when the Academy rolls Rock out for animated feature.

"No — I _have_ fucked Chris Rock," Terezi confidently proclaims.

It seems not even Dirk's heretofore unexplained threats can keep Karkat's mouth shut this time. "You _what??_ When was this?"

"It was before I met you! Well. Before we were dating. It was at one of Ms. Lalonde's pool parties I think," she says, her eyes drifting up in concentrated contemplation with a thoughtful finger to her chin. "It's kind of hazy. I just remember doing a lot of crack and Chris Rock. It was all right."

Karkat's jaw drops open. "You do crack???" he incredulously blurts out; you can't help but be amused by his scandalized innocence. What a fucking baby.

Terezi rolls her eyes. "Like you didn't do a little crack when you were in _your_ 20s."

"No, Terezi, I have _not_ done ' _a little crack cocaine_ '. What the fuck. Who does that?? Who are you??"

" _God,_ you sound like my sister."

"Oh, come on —"

Unsurprisingly, Dirk's response to this line of discussion is to look like he's in the midst of smelling someone's particularly malodorous shit. For the sake of mercy, you take the opportunity to redirect the conversation away from crack.

"So, how has your sister been?" you ask, not particularly expecting an informative answer. Terezi's sister used to be Meenah's college roommate when you were going to WU; you used to be friends, at least until she hit it big in pro skating, became the spokesperson for D.A.R.E. and started refusing to talk to you when you wouldn't stop putting pot jokes in your movies.

Terezi sighs with long-practiced exasperation. "Same as she always is. I swear, she's been a monster ever since she killed Tony Hawk. She doesn't talk to me much anymore either, honestly."

A strange look passes over Dirk's face, and he leans forward to address Terezi. "Your sister is 'Latula Pyrope's Pro Skater' Latula Pyrope?"

"Yeah," Terezi grumbles.

The commercial break you hadn't even realized had started comes to an end, and you lose track of whatever Terezi and Dirk have begun chatting about when Ben Stiller comes out with Emma Stone for an awkward skit and to present best visual effects. If there's any category you should have on lock down, it's visual effects — your team went all fucking out. The shear technical prowess of that festering pile of shit puts everything else Hollywood has produced to shame, nevermind the fact that it's all geared towards creating the most visually unappealing cinematography imaginable. It takes fucking skill to create something that is so ruthlessly bad in every single way and it's about time your flawless artistic vision is recognized.

Of course, fucking Hugo wins again. _Eat a dick, Scorsese._

Ben's done after only one category, and next up is Melissa Leo with supporting actor. You're not expecting much — Don is nominated, but you've had such shit luck up to now that you aren't expecting much. It's shaping up to look like this year is going to be another miss and —

"Donald Glover!" Leo calls out, and the theatre erupts into applause.

 _Holy shit._ Well, it wasn't _your_ win — but it's encouragement. At least your _movies'_ curse is broken. You clap a little more forcefully than you might otherwise as Don enjoys his trip up to the stage. Kid deserves this shit.

He takes up the full time alloted with an acceptance speech that leaves even you feeling a little misty eyed by the end, but the uplifted mood doesn't seem long to last. Another commercial comes and goes, and after the break, Owen is up on stage with Penelope Cruz to present best original score. Loss. Will Ferell and Zack Galifinakis present best original song — loss. Angelina Jolie busts out her ridiculous leg, and to add insult to the continued injury, hands best screenplay to Karkat.

You're practically boiling with rage in your seat as you watch him cross the seemingly insurmountable distance between your row of seats and the stage. You do your best to tune out his nauseating acceptance speech, but you can't help but grow more and more dour.

You feel particularly bitter as you watch Terezi giddily run down the aisle to meet Karkat half-way on his trip back, and you're just about ready to drown a cat when she picks him up and swings him around. The nearby audience erupts into laughter but you can't even find the humor in Karkat's flailing discomfort. It's honestly a struggle to keep your face straight, but you manage well enough to survive the camera shots.

Dirk seems to pick up on your despair, nudging you in the shoulder gently. "Supporting actor's not bad," he says, but he's certainly not winning any Oscars for _his_ acting.

"Yeah, not bad for Don. Too bad it's one of the few parts of the film _I_ didn't have jack shit to do with," you moodily grumble.

"It's _an_ Oscar, for a film you made. You get the Wikipedia blurb now, I guess."

You just wish he would shut up already.

There's another long stretch before anything you're nominated for comes up, but you know that best director has to be next. Your hopes aren't high, but if you have any chance of turning this around, this is it — of course, the Academy continues to piss on your wounds by handing it to Karkat _again._

You sit in moody silence through the Governors Awards and Oprah's standing ovation, and you wish _you_ were dead by the time they bring on the overwrought Academy memorial with Esperanza Spalding.

 _God._ The screenplay and director losses wouldn't even be that bad if it wasn't to fucking _Karkat._ You can't fucking stand the fact that anyone takes his shit seriously or that anyone honestly believes he's a better filmmaker than you are. You're so mad you're seriously considering just up and leaving, because you know you're done, and you resent being forced to sit through your continued humiliation.

"I want to go home," you quietly complain to Dirk. You don't know what you were expecting — he just huffs at you like you're being a ridiculous child.

"Dude, there are only two more categories left, stick it out."

"I'm not going to be able to fucking deal with Vantas winning best picture and rubbing it in my face," you hiss. You're having a bit of difficulty keeping your voice to a whisper, and you can see Terezi curiously straining to make out your words. Now you're starting to get mad at yourself for getting too mad, Jesus dick.

"Oh, man the fuck up, you little baby," Dirk replies, not bothering to do you the courtesy of keeping _his_ voice down. Karkat, of course, catches it, and can't help but release a derisive snort that pushes you just a little bit closer to your breaking point.

 _Fuck it. Just fuck it._ You sit back in your seat and cross your arms and just focus on keeping your expression neutral for the camera. Ben is up for best actor, but you start watching Natalie Portman's presentation with low expectations and you're not disappointed. The award goes to Jean Dujardin and you're properly stiffed yet again.

Meryl Streep picks up best actress, and that all that's left is best picture. Tom Cruise comes out onto the stage with a badly overwrought introduction and moves into a badly overwrought presentation; the best picture mash-up trails off with one of your clips, a repeating loop of Ben Stiller falling down the stairs staged to look like the video is glitching out — Tom Cruise glances back at the screen in scripted confusion and everyone laughs and somehow that sours you to everything even further.

Cruise allows for a moment of anticipation before he finally opens the envelope to announce the winner, and you're just glad to be done with it. The sooner Karkat gets out of the fucking way to make his stupid speech, the sooner you can get the fuck out of here.

You don't quite register the words until Dirk nudges you in your leg and you look up. Every eye in the house is on you and you've just won a fucking Oscar.

... _What?? But —_

Slowly, you rise from your seat. You feel like you're just about going to go deaf from the cheering and the clapping and you _cannot fucking believe you just won an Oscar._ The split second of focused thought that enters your mind is petty fretting about whether or not you should invited Dirk to come on stage with you — you'd brought up your mother or Jade for your Golden Globes wins so what if he thinks you're snubbing him but it's also the fucking _Oscars_ so what if — _You know what? **Fuck it, you won a god damn fucking Oscar.**_

You swear you can hear your mother somewhere in the crowd shrieking your name as you slowly make your way down the aisle, Dirk in tow, to join Ben and Owen and Don and the rest of the present crew and fucking Tom Cruise on stage. Before you know what's happened you've had a statue thrust into your hands and more slaps on the back than you can count, and you're standing in front of the microphone with everyone in the world looking on and your heart feels like it's going to burst from your chest because you just won an Oscar. Ten years and innumerable nominations later and you've finally fucking done it.

"Cool," you say, and walk off the stage.

The theatre erupts into laughter at your non-speech, and for just a moment you consider not being a little shit. In a shocking display of sincerity, you turn back around and climb back onstage to interrupt Ben and Owen's gracious exaltation of your shitty film.

"No, just kidding," you deadpan after wresting the microphone from Stiller's hand mid-sentence. "I'd like to thank me, for writing, directing and producing this train wreck — the Academy for snubbing me for a decade — huh. What else." You pause and scan the crowd. "To my mom, who might be here somewhere maybe? Oh, there she is. Yeah, thanks for wiping my ass for a few years or whatever. My mom rules, the end," you proclaim, handing the mic back to Ben, who resumes right where he'd just left off.

"— Truly honored to have been able to work on such a masterpiece of cinema —"

You don't know what it is that hits you, or what kind of madness it is that overtakes you, but when you look to Dirk awkwardly stood aside with the array of cast and spouses on stage, you don't think. You step away from the stand, slip your hand around the back of his neck and pull him down to kiss him in front of 39.3 million people.

You're not sure you've ever seen Dirk legitimately shocked before, but the look on his face is so utterly and uncharacteristically disarmed that you can be certain that that was just about the absolute last thing he'd ever expected you to do. The thrill of finally having _beaten_ him outweighs the flabbergasted looks from your cast, their guests, the audience and presenters and from all of the people looking on from home with their judgment and scorn — you've won a fucking Oscar and none of it matters anymore. You don't hear them and you don't care.

As the orchestra begins to play and Billy Crystal bids the world goodnight, you don't even bother to look at anyone else. The moment the mic is cut, you go to Dirk and you tell him, "Let's get out of here." Fuck the afterparties, fuck the interviews and fuck the photoshoots — you're too fucking keyed up to give a shit about any of that. You don't even care to go to the Governor's Ball to have your statue engraved; either you can do it later or it doesn't matter at all.

You take Dirk by the hand and you move through the crowds of the theatre, avoid all the bustle of the red carpet and find your way back to your punctual driver. Your relief is palpable once you're finally out of the spotlight in the safety of your limousine; you stretch out on the spacious back seats and let out a giggle that borders on maniacal.

"I did it. I fucking did it!" you exclaim, looking to Dirk with a face full of wonder you don't make even the slightest effort to conceal. For once, he seems content to let you have it.

You haven't had a drop to drink but you feel buzzed all the same. The moment you're through the door to your apartment you've put the statue aside and the only thing you can concern yourself with is the feeling of Dirk's lips on yours, your body pressed to his — you tear at each other's clothes in a messy, stumbling path to your bedroom, collapsing onto your bed in a discombobulated tangle of limbs and urge.

You don't know how long it's been since you got hard but it feels like forever, and you rut against him and pant out ragged breaths of sound too desperate to communicate any information, but Dirk knows you, and he knows what you want. Just the touch of his fingers on your skin sets you aflame; he runs his hands over your thighs and up your sides and licks and sucks at the skin of your neck, tantalizing you with just enough stimulation to incense but fail to satiate.

You're too on edge to deal with preparation so you don't. You clumsily wedge your shaking hand between your bodies and take him into your hand to guide him against you, and your hand is just too small to hold the both of you. Dirk takes a moment to adjust himself before he adds his hand to yours, and you release a heavy breath. Both of you are already dripping and it doesn't take long before your hands are moving smoothly in erratic strokes, clumsily and without rhythm, but for all the sloppiness and lack of care it's about as intense as anything you've ever felt.

His lips find yours again and your hands wander to fist in his hair, claw at his back; Dirk is able to take a much quicker pace without your hand awkwardly in the way. You arch up needily into his touch and it seems to set him off — he growls deep in his throat and bites at your lip and you bite back, and you feel the roughness of his palm and his thickness and heat and the sensation of his rapid pulse against you and it's just about all that you can bear. 

As soon as it began you're finished, and each part of you goes slack in succession. You lay where you are, chest heaving and too dazed to move, as he feverishly jacks off above your body; it's not long before he's covered your stomach and chest and collapsed into a similarly exhausted heap beside you.

It's probably the quickest quickie you've ever had, bereft of much of any buildup or finesse, but you don't think you've ever felt more satisfied than you do right now.

It's a peculiar feeling. You lay there, covered in semen, wasted but completely sober, and you just... _look_ at Dirk. At the lines of his face, the strange set of his nose, the beautiful intensity of his clear eyes — something in your chest swells and at once you feel this _anxiety,_ like there's so _much_ of it bottled up inside of you that you can't contain it and it makes you restless to the point of madness. You want to reach out and pull him into your arms, to smother him, to consume and be subsumed, but just kissing and touching him isn't enough. You feel like you need to scream.

"I love you," you blurt out instead.

He doesn't answer for a long time. You hadn't really expected him to. He just looks into your eyes, his own lazy and half lidded, breath even and slow -- and as soon as you're sure he intends to say nothing at all, he replies, "I know."

You kiss him. You reach out with your hand and pull his face to yours and brush your lips to his, your eyes squeezed shut, and when he moves against you you release a rattly breath that belies a need for him far more desperate than you'd like to admit. You press your bodies closer, taking in his warmth and his scent and the taste of his lips on your tongue. You don't even understand how or why he makes you so happy, especially when he so fucking _doesn't,_ but just in this moment you know that he truly, truly does. There's this heavy heat in your chest and you feel giddy and lightheaded and high and when your eyes flicker open to look into his all you want to do is _smile._ You love him, you really do.

The only uncertainty you find is in your past. You felt the thrill of Meenah's novelty and the intensity of her absence, and you remember the safety and complacency you felt with Jade — but did you actually _love_ them? It's not the first time you've said the words, but you aren't sure that you've ever felt the way that you do right in this moment. There's no routine in it, no expectation of reciprocation or that it is what is demanded of you or because it makes _sense,_ or because it's about time — you said it because you meant it and the conviction with you know this is so utterly disarming you don't know how to process it. You can explain why you love Jade — you've done so dozens of times, to her and everyone else and to yourself — but you know immediately that there is no logic in this, no idea why it is so despite this or that and whatever things tell you so clearly that you really, really shouldn't, but you do, you do, and its defiance of explanation explains just enough to liberate you completely.

So you let go. You let go of your self-doubt and your insecurity and your anger and your resentment because it means nothing. You exhale in catharsis; all that's left is you.


	24. Chapter 24

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> This is the beginning of the closing act of this story and there is a bit of a tone shift from this chapter on. If you cannot handle some heavy content, now may be a good time to take a pass. If there's anything that gets you particularly upset, I'd suggest you employ the buddy system from here on out. Consider yourself warned.

"The devil is a phone call," Rose says.

With time, you lose sight of the sardonic twinge you thought you heard in her words.

It comes on a day where you've woken far earlier in the morning than would be typical; you're not sure it was premonition or happenstance that you rose feeling as you did, sick to your stomach and fatigued. Dirk lies asleep next to you, rare enough a sight.

After a while of failing to return to sleep, you eventually accept your plight and pull yourself out of bed. There's a dull ache in your temple, so you stumble to the bathroom to take a few aspirin. You hear the faint sound of your phone ringing through the bathroom door, curse, and rush back into the bedroom to answer it.

"Hi Dave," you hear from the other side of the line. There's something strange to the tone of his voice, as if it were a moment from cracking. You feel uneased.

"Hey dude," you answer with a lazy yawn, chalking it up to a stomach bug. You keep your voice down so as not to disturb Dirk. "What's up?"

"There's something I need to, uh — talk to you about."

Not a stomach bug.

You furrow your brow and take your phone out with you onto the bedroom terrace. The sun has nearly started to rise; you can see its rays peeking out over the glimpses of horizon you see between the tall buildings of the city. It hurts to look at it.

"What is it?" you ask, anxiety rising in your voice. God, you hate that. _'We need to talk'_. Just say it.

"Well. Um, haha — I didn't want to have to be the one to — but Rose wouldn't, so, um —"

"Dammit, John," you groan. "It's too early in the morning for this shit. What happened?"

"She fell down the stairs. Mom did, I mean."

 _Jesus Christ._ Well, you figured this was going to happen to her eventually, with how much she drinks and how big that house is. "Agh. Did she break anything?"

John takes a moment to reply. "Well, she broke... her neck."

"Holy shit," you breathe. "Is she okay? She's not paralyzed, is she?"

"The paramedics said it was probably painless."

You stop. You don't know for how long the both of you are on the phone for complete silence.

"Shut the fuck up," you eventually say. "This isn't fucking funny, John."

"I'm not —"

" _Incredible,_ dude. You warned her, right? _You warned her about stairs, bro??_ Cut it the fuck out."

"Dave," is all John says.

You hang up.

You walk back into your bedroom. Dirk is sat up, awake; he looks at you questioningly, but before he can ask or you could answer, your phone rings again. When you lift it to your ear again, your hands are shaking. "What?" you spit into the receiver.

This time, it's Rose on the other end. She, at least, cuts to the chase. "Our mother is dead and this is not a joke."

"I—"

"You need to come to the house, now," Rose commands you.

"The house? What, are you the— _how long has she been dead?_ "

Rose doesn't answer — all she says to you before she hangs up is, "We'll talk about it when you're here."

You stand motionless for a while, and then you sit down on the edge of your bed. You don't know whether to be thankful or agitated that Dirk says nothing.

"I have to go," you tell him. You're not sure what else to say.

"Do you want me to come with you?" he offers; either he's picked up enough from your one-sided phone call to surmise what's happened, or he doesn't think it appropriate to ask why or where.

"No," you say.

You're not sure if you regret it.

 

***

 

You stand at the foot of the staircase and it's impossible to tell that anything's happened. There's no blood — nothing has broken or gone out of place. It smells the same as it always does.

You've walked around the entire house twice. You asked them to give you a minute and you've taken twenty. You find the three of them sat back in the parlor, unmoved from where they were when you left them. When you find yourself stood in the doorway again, they look to you, and they wait.

"When did it happen?" you ask. Your voice sounds so calm. If you're angry or upset you're not sure you feel it.

"She fell three days ago," your stepfather says.

"You didn't tell me my mother died for three days." It's not an accusation. Just a statement.

"I found her," he says. He gaze trails back to the ground. "I didn't feel that — I believed that it would be even worse for you to have heard about it for me. I understand that we haven't —"

"I would have rather known," you say. Your lips are dry. You lick them and it doesn't help.

"And if I'd told you I suspect you'd feel the opposite."

Something flares in your gut and it's as unwelcome a feeling as you've ever had. _Not fucking now._ "Just stop," you tell him. You're not wearing your sunglasses. You didn't think to put them on. You wish you had.

"We need to discuss the funeral arrangements," Rose says. She's wearing black. You hate it. You hate her. You hate everyone in this room.

John stares at the pattern of the carpet on the floor and says nothing. He wishes he wasn't here. You do too.

No one objects, but no one speaks. Rose clears her throat. "She'd want to be buried in New York, at the lab."

"I think she should be buried here," your stepfather objects. "She hasn't lived in New York in almost twenty years. This is her home now, and it's closest to most of her family. I'd like to be able to visit her grave."

You can tell Rose is on edge; her fists are balled in the fabric of her skirt over her knees and her mouth is drawn into a tight line. She wasn't expecting there to be an argument. "With all due respect, I know she'd like to be buried in New York, because I've discussed it with her."

Egbert furrows his brow. "What? When did she say that? How did that even come up?"

"It was when we were interring Jaspers. She said that — one day she would —" It's rare to see Rose lose track of her words. "That one day we would see him again. When we were both buried with him too."

"What? That sounds like a _joke_ — she was just saying that to —"

"No, you don't _know_ h—"

" _Know_ her?! She was my _wife,_ for Christ's sake! I think I'd know what she's like!"

"And I am her _daughter,_ blood of her _fucking_ blood, and I am telling you that we had _discussed_ this and she told me where she would like to be laid to rest," Rose grits out. "And you can either accept it, or you could continue to fight against her wishes in order to fulfill your own selfish desire for _grave proximity._ "

"It seems to me that that's exactly what _you're_ doing!"

"Excuse me? Do you think I _want_ my mother's corpse to be interred in the yard of my _home?_ It's _ghastly_ and it makes me shudder to think of but I'll —"

"Then you shouldn't have any pr—"

" _But I'll do it because **that's what she would hav—**_ "

"But it's _ridiculous!_ "

"Will you both just shut the fuck _up!?_ " You yell, pressing your palms into your temples. "God, _fuck!_ This is — god — just fuck you, Egbert. If she wanted to be buried in New York, we're going to fucking bury her in New York."

The look on your stepfather's face is so pitiful and grief-stricken that you almost feel bad for him, even as devoid of empathy for him as you are. He seems to realize that arguing with you about anything is a complete lost cause, so he simply sets his jaw and looks away, simmering in anger.

You know it's not the first time he's lost a wife. You don't care.

"She... the body... will have to be sent to New York," Rose says. She's not looking at anyone anymore either. "I will... I suppose I'll find a funeral home, and I'll. I'll make the arrangements."

"No. I'll do it," your stepfather says.

"But —"

"You're still young, Rose. I want you to stay that way."

For once, Rose has nothing left to say.

 

***

 

You're nineteen years old and it's raining.

Your fingers are trembling as you try to force the quarters into the slot of the payphone. You're drenched, your thin T-shirt clinging to your skin — you never imagined Los Angeles would be so cold.

It's even harder to dial the numbers. You're terrified that you've put in the wrong one, even though you're positive you haven't, and you feel like you're on the verge of tears when you finally put the receiver to your ear.

It rings and rings and rings. What if she doesn't answer? What if _he_ answers? You think he's at work, but — you're not going to talk to him. You're going to have to hang up and try again if he answers. Will you have to spend another two hours begging for more change? You have nothing to your name but an empty backpack.

Just when you're sure the call is about to ring to its end, your mother picks up. "Hello?"

"Mom," you bleat shakily into the phone. You are so far over your head.

"Dave," you hear your mother exhale over the phone. "Oh my god, I'm so happy you're — I was _so_ worried, god — where were you? Where are you?"

"I just want to come home," is all you can say. You can't manage anything else.

"Oh, baby. My baby. Of course you can come home. I love you. Just come home."

But you can't come home. Home is more than a thousand miles away and you don't have a single dollar in your wallet. You don't even know where you are. Your mother tells you she'll try calling the airport to see if there's a way she can book you a flight home over the phone. She tells you you'll need to call her back in an hour.

You spend the next three begging for quarters again. No one has the time or energy to spend on some street rat who hasn't had a change of clothes in a week or a bath in even longer. You're not sure even the rain masks how bad you smell.

When you finally call her back, she tells you the earliest flight out she could get was on Saturday — two days from now. They took her card fine, so she called a hotel nearby as well and booked you a room to stay in until your flight back.

It's a four hour walk from where you are to the hotel — at least, that's how far it'd be if you actually had any idea where you are. You go from gas station to gas station until some attendant takes enough pity on you to trade you a map for your backpack; the sun has risen by the time you actually limp your way through the doors of the hotel.

The only thing you have to eat for the next two days are the complimentary apples left out in the hallway of your hotel room. You do have a shower, though, and wash your clothes in the sink as best as you can. You spend 45 minutes trying to use a hairdryer to dry them.

When you land back in Seattle, your mother is waiting for you at the gate. When she sees you, you're afraid she's going to yell at you and chastise you for being so fucking stupid — but she just smiles, and you throw yourself into her arms. It's such a fucking relief to be home.

It's the first time you think of it that way.

"I went to find Meenah," you eventually tell her. You have your knees up against your chest, leaned against the passenger door of the car. You feel so tired.

"I figured," she says. "Did you find her?"

"Yeah." You sniffle. You have a cold. "I found her."

Your mother lets you leave it at that.

"Please don't tell anyone where I was," you plead. She doesn't answer; you only notice that she's pulled off the highway onto the wrong exit. "Where are you —"

 _Oh._ Just a bit off the highway is a little ice cream parlor you haven't been to in years. Your mother used to take you here when you'd first moved to Washington. It didn't... remind you of home or anything, but it helped you forget, for a little while. No sister, no stepfather, no annoying little stepbrother — just you, your mom and the largest bowls of ice cream money can buy.

You're _nineteen fucking years old_ and you're crying in the middle of an ice cream parlor.

"Dave, you're going to be okay," your mother tells you, holding your hand in hers. You squeeze her fingers tight but you're not sure it helps.

"I don't fucking get it," you choke out, doing your best to keep your voice low. You're in a corner booth, but you're still afraid someone might be witness to your self-imposed public humiliation. "I don't get how she could just — how she could —"

"She left because she was scared, Dave."

"How the fuck could she be afraid of _me?_ Jesus Christ, I'm fucking pathetic —"

"Not of you."

"Of what?"

"Of having to grow up? Of having to consider the feelings of any person who isn't her? Of having to accept that she's capable of loving someone?" your mother suggests. "That girl has done nothing but trample other people and run away from her problems her entire life, and she wasn't about to stop for you."

You mother never liked Meenah. You wish you hadn't, either.

"What are you doing?"

You're thirty-three years old and you've been staring at the tub of ice cream in your freezer for fifteen minutes.

You don't have an answer for him, but it's the first time you cry. You choke, and you try to stop, because you don't want to, not in front of him. But you can't. It comes and it doesn't stop.

Dirk freezes where he stands. He just looks at you as if he's paralyzed. He doesn't know what to do any more than you do.

"... It'll be okay," he tries to tell you. You both know it's a meaningless platitude. When it does nothing to help, he mumbles, "Should I..."

It takes you a while to compose yourself well enough to speak. "You don't need to stay," you tell him. 

He leaves you as you are.

 

***

 

Your sister picks you and your stepfather up from the airfield. You said nothing to your stepfather during the flight, and you say nothing to your sister during the long car ride up to the laboratory. 

John and Jade have already arrived. It's the first time you've seen Jade since last Christmas. Her eyes are shining wet — close to tears, but not quite. She just hugs you when you meet.

"It's going to be a bit crowded with all of the people who are going to be staying here," Rose somberly informs you. The funeral is a week out, and you know that Aradia, Eridan, and the fucking poolboy will be arriving closer to the day. "Dave, do you mind sharing a room with Jade?"

Jade releases you from her hug. You nod. "That's fine."

It turns out John brought his fiancée as well. You're surprised to see her, and a little bitter, but you're not sure why. You're not sure the two of you say a word to each other the entire time even so.

There's a lot of time left in the day but it passes in a blur. Kanaya makes dinner for everyone, but you barely touch your plate even as hungry as you are. Your biological impulses feel like such a distant artifice.

Rose shows you to a guest room as the day draws to an end. It's a sparsely furnished room, with a small desk and end table and little else. It used to be your room when you lived here. It's unrecognizable to you.

You and Jade move your things into the small room, and find yourselves alone. You try to think of the last time you were alone together since you broke up and come up short. It's a bit awkward, but probably for reasons other than your breakup. 

"We should... probably go to sleep now," Jade announces.

"Yeah," you say. You shrug. "Want me to take the floor?"

Jade smiles weakly. "It's just us. It's fine."

So you agree to share the bed. You usually just sleep in your underwear, but you leave a T-shirt on — much more strange is to see Jade wearing _anything_ to bed.

The guest bed is not the largest bed in the world. Jade turns off the light and you both settle into it in the darkness. She's always been a heavy sleeper, and relaxes easily. You don't have such luck.

You lay awake for a while. You were expecting it. After it's been long enough for you to be sure it's not coming, you quietly whisper, "Are you still awake?"

Jade opens her eyes and shifts to look at you. It doesn't seem like you woke her up. "Dave?" she asks.

You just look at her and the concerned expression on her face. You can't think of anything to say, and you don't know why you got her attention.

You kiss her.

"Dave, what are you doing?" Jade quietly asks you. She doesn't pull away abruptly, or very far, but she pulls away. Her lips are still so close that you can feel her breath on your skin. 

"I miss you," you say. Truthfully, you're lonely.

"You have a boyfriend," she carefully reminds you. It's dark and you can't see very well, but her eyes are still so bright.

"He's not here."

Jade sighs, and kisses you back, but you can tell she has no intention of going any further than that. She pulls you into her arms and you breathe in her scent. She's warm. "I love you so much, Dave," she whispers.

"I love you too," you mumble back.

You sleep as well as you ever have.

 

***

 

The sky is shitty and overcast. There's still snow on the ground. You'd forgotten how much you hated snow. Your warm breath ghosts into the air and you resent yourself for not even thinking to pack warm clothes. It didn't even occur to you that it would still be snowing in April. Rose lent you a jacket but it doesn't really fit. You feel stupid. You're surrounded by your family and you feel alone.

Your stepfather insisted that the funeral be presided over by a pastor. While you're naturally incensed by just about any suggestion your stepfather proposes, you were particularly agitated by this one. You had a shouting fit in the living room when he let it slip. You were so angry you could barely speak, but you're not sure it was entirely due to the arrangements. Rose had to take you aside to talk you down.

"Mom wasn't even a fucking Christian," you argued. "Where the fuck does he get off —"

"He needs it," Rose told you. You recalled those first few weeks after moving to Washington, when your stepfather had tried to force you both to attend church with him. Rose had been just as opposed to it as you were then, but you found yourself without an ally here. "Just let it go."

You almost surprised yourself when the fight just went out of you. After years and years and years and years you finally reached the point where even you couldn't fucking do it anymore.

So you let it go, and now you're standing in the snow in a jacket that's too small in front of a gaping hole in the backyard of your childhood home. There was no church nearby, so the entire service was held by the lab. You listen to the old white man in black drone through his final words about Jesus and your eyes glaze over. You stare unfocused at the rosewood casket and all of it feels unreal.

You didn't hold a viewing. You didn't think you could handle it — or at least, your stepfather didn't, and for once you didn't disagree. You realize that you haven't actually seen your mother in months and something in your chest bottoms out. What was the last thing you ever said to her? You don't even remember. It was probably something stupid. You can't remember. You didn't expect to need to remember.

They're lowering your mother's body into the ground and you're the only one who's crying. Not Rose, not John, not Jade or even Eridan. Your stepfather is the driest fucking eye in the house. Jade entwines her fingers with yours and you squeeze back but it doesn't help. You feel so humiliated and miserable and alone and you don't want to be here, you really don't. You don't fucking understand funerals. You have no idea who this was supposed to bring closure to because this has done nothing but gore an already fresh wound that much wider. You're choking and you sound ridiculous and pathetic and it's the only sound you can hear in the desolate cold silence of the forest.

Your stepfather throws the first flower into the grave. He lingers for a moment, and then turns to leave without a word.

The rest of your family follows suit. Rose goes next, and then you. Jade never lets go of your hand. You don't bother to linger after it's done — you head straight back to the house and to your room where no one can see you. All but Jade, who stays with you and lets you cry with your head on her lap until you can't cry any more, until you're just empty and can no longer muster the energy to even think.

You return home right after the funeral. You don't have the vigor to board a plane, but you do. Dirk at least has the decency to pick you up from the airfield so you don't have to get a driver. The ride back is tense, but you suppose most things between you are.

"... I'm sorry about your mom," Dirk tells you when you find yourselves stood in the living room of your apartment again, with an uncharacteristically feeble slouch and hands awkwardly thrust into his pockets. You look at him and feel nothing.

It hasn't even been two weeks and it's... over. The funeral is done. Your mother is in the ground. All of the legal and monetary issues are out of your hands. There's nothing for you to do. It doesn't feel like any time has passed at all. 

Suddenly you're faced with the prospect of... having to actually live you life. How the fuck do you move forward after this? The concept just seems insurmountable. You have no clue how you're supposed to do anything now. You're already hideously overdue on your next SBaHJ script and the idea of sitting down and actually finishing it seems absolutely unthinkable. You have no will, no vitality, no desire; just getting up in the morning seems like it's going to be a Herculean feat by itself.

Dirk goes to his room and you sit down on the couch alone. You're not sure what else to do. You don't want to watch TV, so you just stare at your indistinct reflection in the black screen.

It occurs to you that you're hungry but you don't have the energy to do anything about it. You lay down on your side, because it's easier than sitting up. Your limbs feel weak and shaky. You close your eyes and ignore it.

"... Are you coming to bed?" you eventually hear. You open your eyes and Dirk is stood in front of you. The sun has set, apparently. You hadn't noticed the time passing. You're not sure if you slept. You didn't dream.

It's a bit of an effort to sit up, you're so weak. Dirk just watches you with an inscrutable expression. He only reacts when you attempt to stand and fail miserably; he catches you, if only on reflex. "Shit, kid, have you even eaten anything since you got back?" he asks. You can hear the almost sheepish lack of confidence in his voice. It's utterly bizarre.

"I've gone longer without eating than this without it being a problem," you quietly protest, despite your readily apparent inability to actually support your own weight. Dirk dismissively grunts and deposits your body back onto the couch where it was.

When he disappears from sight, you aren't exactly expecting him to come back. You settle back into your previous position on the couch, your knees drawn up against your chest. You're startled when he nudges you brusquely with his leg.

"Wh..." you start. Your eyes are unfocused. He sits down on the couch next to you, shoving you as much as necessary to give himself space, and puts the plate down in front of your face. It's a sandwich. It looks like it's just peanut butter and jelly.

"Fuckin' eat," he tells you.

It's an effort, but you comply. It's apple jelly. You're happy. It's such a small fucking thing but it makes you happy. You feel like you're going to cry again and you can't let yourself, you don't want to — to — you're not sure. You get up and go into the kitchen to _hide_ and try to calm yourself down, and it's a struggle but you clench your jaw and blink your eyes and will yourself to stop.

"Dude, what's up?" he asks. He followed you into the kitchen. You turn and look at him and you're sure your eyes are glassy but you pretend they're not.

"I just wanted a glass of water," you lie.

You get one. You drink it. He doesn't seem to know what to say. You down the glass and set it back onto the counter and then you don't know what to say either. "Thanks," you settle on. Dirk shrugs, mumbles something. You don't catch it.

"Should probably go to bed. Now," you say. "I guess."

Dirk nods. You follow him to your bedroom and you undress. Your body feels heavy when you crawl into bed and collapse. Dirk climbs in beside you — behind you — and pulls you against his chest. You let him. He seems unsure of it.

He kisses your neck. His arms shift, and his palm slides down your stomach, lower and lower until you turn — he kisses your lips when you face him but you stop him. "Not right now," you tell him. You can feel his erection against your hip.

"Okay," he says. He licks his lips. You're not sure of how okay it is.

He doesn't push it, though. He turns away from you and gives you some space and you're not sure how to communicate that you don't want it, so you don't.

You close your eyes and pretend to sleep until you eventually lose track of the time.


	25. Chapter 25

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> blanket content warning still in effect

You're so stupid. You're so fucking stupid. Why did you look? You don't know why you looked.

ROXY LALONDE: NOT WARNED ABOUT STAIRS?

Pictured: Dave Lalonde, 33. "I told you about stairs, Mom. I warned you, dog."

WHY DIDN'T DAVE LALONDE TELL HIS MOTHER ABOUT STAIRS?

FAMED MOVIE DIRECTOR DAVE LALONDE ULTIMATELY BESTED BY STAIRS

SWEET BRO AND HELLA JEFF CREATOR'S MOTHER SHOULD HAVE LISTENED TO WARNINGS ABOUT STAIRS

You can't stop yourself. You click through link after link of the same fucking joke. Over and over and over and over again. You're shaking. You don't know what to do. You don't know how to even process this.

You keep thinking about your mother falling down the stairs. It's easy. You've filmed this scene so many times.

 _It keeps happening._ You can hear her neck snap and see the dead glassy look in her eyes as she lays crumpled at the foot of the stairs. You stand up from your chair and your chest seizes up. Your heart is beating, really, really fast. You can hear the blood in your ears. This isn't normal. It's hard to breathe. You can't breathe.

You stumble out of your office in a daze and your vision is blurry and unfocused. It's hard to even stand. _The paramedics said it was probably painless. Probably. Probably._ You feel so nauseated but you've had nothing to eat, you know you won't throw up. The bile threatens to rise all the same.

It takes all of the effort you can muster to draw breath enough to speak. "Dirk?" you call out. Your voice is weak. You're not sure he's even heard you. You only find him once you've finally managed to pull yourself to his room. Your mom used to stay in this room when she'd visit you.

He's turning around in his chair when you clumsily push open the door. An expression of mildly constrained irritation is directed at you. "I'm bus—"

"I — I think." You cut him off and he at least has the decency to shut up. You take the deepest breath you can manage. You feel like you're breathing out of a straw. Even now you feel pressured to appear as calm as possible and you don't know if it's working at all. It makes you even more anxious. "I think. You might need to take me to the hospital. Maybe. Or, or — get Aradia to — I can't —"

"What's wrong?" he asks, rising from his chair. He takes his time. He's not worried at all. He never is.

"I — uh, I can't — really — breathe?" you choke out. This is impossible. You don't know why you even came to him. You should have just stayed where you were and died. It would have been easier. You feel worse. It keeps getting worse and worse and worse and worse and — 

"You sick?" he asks you. He's standing in front of you. You hadn't noticed him moving. It startles you.

You don't even know how to answer the question. "I don't — I?" you grip the doorframe for balance. Your legs feel like they're about to give way. "I can't breathe," you repeat. You don't know what else to say. Is that sick? You don't know. It feels like your vision is pulsing in time with your deafening heartbeat.

"Mn. You're probably having a panic attack."

"I —"

"It's not surprising. I guess. Since your mother died."

"I can't —"

"You'll be fine. It'll go away once you've laid down for a while. It happens."

"I can't breathe," you sputter incredulously. 

"You're fine."

Your legs do give way. You slide down against the doorframe to the floor. Dirk just looks down at you, expressionless.

This better just be a fucking panic attack because you're evidently not going anywhere until it's over.

Dirk steps past you into the living room and leaves you alone. You don't even bother moving. Maybe if you just stay here it really will stop. You stare unfocused at the ground and try to think of nothing but that's always much, much harder than it seems.

You're surprised when Dirk returns and sets a glass of water down on the floor in front of you, but you don't know what you're supposed to do with it. You're not thirsty. Even if you were, it's not like your hand is steady enough to actually hold a glass of water. You look up at him wordlessly and you have no idea what your face must look like.

"I'm trying," he says, frustrated.

"Thanks," you reply. Your voice is dead of any tone.

Something in his expression changes but you can't place what. Anger? Bitterness? Resignation? Whatever it is, it's not pleasant, but he doesn't speak of it and neither do you. His mouth hardens into a line and you look away from him and you just sit in silence like that, for god knows how long, until you realize whatever danger you imagined has passed and there's nothing left but the two of you.

"... I have work I need to do," he eventually tells you.

You stand. You still feel fatigued and out of breath, but you can manage. "Okay," you say.

You go back to bed. You don't sleep, and Dirk never joins you.

 

***

 

You can't help but dwell on it. The next afternoon, you bar yourself from your computer for fear of seeing more of it again, but the lack of anything to do drives you stir crazy. All you can think to do is talk to Rose. You don't know if she is going to be any more comfort than Dirk, but it's something. You open your phone and pester her.

turntechGodhead [TG] began pestering tentacleTherapist [TT]

TG: how the fuck did they find out   
TT: What?   
TG: look at any fucking news site rose   
TT: Oh.  
TT: That.  
TT: I'm sorry. I didn't want to tell you. I guess I'd hoped you wouldn't see it.   
TG: did you tell the fucking press  
TG: my publicists announcement didnt fucking say anything about how she died   
TT: God.  
TT: Of course not.  
TT: The only other people besides John and his father who knew how she died were the police and coroner.   
TG: jesus fucking christ  
TG: how could they even  
TG: FUCK   
TT: I thought this might happen, but I didn't want to believe that people would actually be so utterly disgusting.   
TG: do i have to fucking deal with this now  
TG: am i going to have people coming up to me for fucking years telling me jokes about how my fucking mom fell down the stairs and died and how thats so fucking hilarious???  
TG: is this going to be the new fucking steve irwin stingray halloween costume  
TG: jesus fucking christ why did she have to die like this  
TG: literally any other god damn way in the universe  
TG: im never going to  
TG: this wont fucking stop this is going to haunt me for my entire life  
TG: rose im fucking  
TG: i dont know  
TG: how to do anything  
TG: i cant handle any of this i really fucking cant  
TG: i feel so fucking horrible   
TT: I'm sorry.   
TG: why are you sorry  
TG: its not your fucking fault   
TT: I just don't know what else to say.   
TG: i dont either  
TG: its like just festering inside me and i want to get it out but theres not anything i can say that even approaches to articulate  
TG: just  
TG: i want to be fucking dead   
TT: Dave...   
TG: what   
TT: I don't know. There's nothing I can say that will make this better, so I won't.  
TT: I don't want to lie to you. I don't want to pretend to be able to help you when I can't.  
TT: I need to go.

tentacleTherapist [TT] ceased pestering turntechGodhead [TG]

 

***

 

"You know what this is about," she gravely informs you. You sigh.

You pace around the room with the phone to your ear. Talking to this bitch is stressful in even the most benign of circumstances, let alone when she's actively riding your ass at the most terrible point of your life. "I'm working on it," you lie.

In truth, you've barely even been trying. You know the results won't be satisfactory. Is it really that big of a deal if you don't put out a fucking movie for a year?

You don't dare to say it. Instead, the false pacifications continue to tumble from your mouth. "I'll have it done within the month."

"Good," Meenah says, and hangs up.

What a fucking farce. You barely even have a fourth of it written. There's no way you're going to finish the entire script in under a month. You're just kicking the can down the road.

You fool yourself into thinking you're going to make an effort anyway and sit down at your desk. You pull open the file and scroll to to the bottom — not nearly so long a distance as it should be — and blankly stare at where you've left off. The blinking line at the end of the page stares you in the face.

How the fuck are you supposed to write a joke?

It's never been particularly difficult for you to make light of your circumstances but today you can't fucking do it. It used to be how you would cope with shit like this — not that anything else has ever so completely knocked you on your ass this way — but you are just so utterly disarmed that you don't even have that anymore. The idea of experiencing any kind of joy or humor at all feels macabre and disrespectful and however ridiculous you know that it is, you can't make the feeling go away. So you make the responsibility go away instead.

The only thing that gets done that day is a flippant tweet and an email to Eridan telling him to cancel more of your scheduled interviews.

 

***

 

The month comes and goes.

You're no further into your script than you were before your mother died.

You're honestly not even really trying anymore. You know the effort will be futile, so you engage with other things passively. It's much easier to sit in your office and watch Mythbusters for ten hours a day while pretending to work than it is to actually do any work. At this point, the lies you're feeding your increasingly harried production team don't even faze you. Their complaints don't seem real, and the future consequences seem even less so. You don't even understand how you could care about them. You could quit entirely and be none the worse for it. The only reason you don't is because you still have a sliver of hope left that this all will pass.

But it hasn't passed yet. One day turns into another and the crushing spectre of ennui persists. You don't even feel _sad_ anymore. You're too tired to be sad. You're just bereft of energy, listless and dispassionate and unable to muster a single shit about anything. You almost _miss_ the tears and overpowering grief — you at least felt like you were alive, however much you wish you weren't. Now, the thought of suicide seems like _effort_.

You close up yet another day of accomplishing nothing and emerge from your office to settle into another bout of staring at the television. It's no different from what you're doing while you're sitting at your work computer, not doing any work, but you've somehow managed to segregate the two activities. You spend your time in front of the computer feeling all of the guilt for not doing anything you feel you need to feel, and then you sit down on the couch and let it go. You accept that there's no point left in pretending you can do anything and just... let it go.

Your eyes glaze over as you gaze unfocused at the television. You aren't paying any attention to what's going on on the screen. It really doesn't matter. You use the indistinct sounds and bright lights to scramble your senses until you can trick your brain into just shutting off; the bottle of booze you've begun to down is certainly contributing to that as well. You hate the taste of straight gin, but a combination of laziness and masochism impede rectifying that.

It's nearing midnight when Dirk wanders into the living room and sits down next to you on the couch. You and Dirk haven't really been around each other that much lately — sometimes you go to bed together, and sometimes you don't, but other than that, the both of you lock yourselves up in your room and barely speak beyond the basic niceties. You're a little surprised to see him voluntarily put himself in your presence.

"What are you watching?" he absently asks. You know he doesn't care about the answer any more than you do.

"I 'unno," you shrug.

You're less drunk than you wish you were. It's getting harder and harder to bring yourself to blackout, the more nights you spend drinking yourself into an oblivious coma. It's a good thing money isn't an object.

You flinch when Dirk extends an arm over your shoulders. His awkward attempts at intimacy are always surprising to you, for an array of reasons, but you hazard accepting the gesture without comment. You release a sigh, and a little bit of the tension from your body; it's not much, but it helps, a little bit. You let yourself lean against him as you don't watch the TV, and hope it's not too much longer before you're tired enough to sleep.

Dirk apparently has other designs. He kisses you, and you let him; you can't remember when was the last time you kissed him, or hugged him, or did anything with him that didn't involve an awkward physical distance. The sensation seems so oddly foreign to you, however many times you've done it in the past. It's wet and his lips feel clammy, his rougher skin feels strange against yours, and all of the logistics — your nose, your teeth, your tongue — seem so clumsy and impedimental. It doesn't taste that great, either. It's a mystery to you how kissing used to _arouse_ you.

You're not sure you've even had a boner in months.

Dirk, on the other hand, has clearly not been having any such problems. After a bit of a shift, you are able to feel his distinct lack of flaccidity — and given his nature, you figure it best to put a stop to this now before it goes down that path. You're drunk enough that your first request for him to stop comes out as an unintelligible mumble, and he works past that to gently push you down onto the couch. Your second attempt to communicate is a little more clear. "Dirk," you sigh, pulling away from his lips. He directs his attention to your neck instead. "Stop it — I can't —"

He ignores you, biting into the flesh between your shoulder and neck. You wince and curse; that's certainly not a very welcome sensation right now. "Seriously, come on, stop," you tell him, growing frustrated, but when he still doesn't acquiesce, you resort to trying to push him off physically.

He pulls back, only to pin your wrists beside your head. The look he gives you sends a chill down your spine. "Shut up," he tells you.

Suddenly it dawns on you that he's serious. He's actually going to do this. You think back to all of the other times he's pulled this shit and you've let him and you know that he means it and he intends to get what he wants through any means necessary. He always does. What makes this time any different?

You know you don't have a chance. You struggle but he easily overpowers you; even if you weren't drunkenly uncoordinated, you'd never be able to match his physical strength. You tell him to stop but he takes it as insincerity. The fear pooled in your stomach turns into panic and nausea and you have no idea what to do. You've never had to think about this happening to you in your life. Your mother never told you any cautionary tales about predatory men who want to take advantage of you. You have no tricks, no strategies, no experience and little instinct.

The only thing that saves you is a clumsily aimed knee to his groin. He didn't see it coming; he immediately seizes up from the pain and you're able to extract yourself before he can react.

You stop and you're shaking and staring at him with wide eyes a safe distance from his grasp. You feel distressingly sober now. Part of you wonders if you should run; the prospect of him still coming after you after you've made it _this clear_ isn't beyond your imagination but part of you still clings to the idea that _maybe he just didn't mean it. Maybe you're overreacting. Maybe if you stick around everything will turn out okay._

"What the fuck, dude!?" Dirk incredulously grits out through his teeth, still doubled over in agony. He doesn't follow you. He probably would have already if he had any intention to. It makes you feel less nervous but not any less sick.

"You tried to rape me," you say. The words feel clumsy on your tongue and even dumber in the air. This is fucking ridiculous. You feel ridiculous.

"Wh — what?" he replies, _confused. He doesn't even understand what you're talking about._ "I thought you wanted me to —" 

You are just flabbergasted. "Why the fuck did you think I wanted this? I said no a hundred fucking times, I _told_ you to stop. I didn't want to —" 

"What the fuck do you expect me to think!?" he sputters. He's becoming a little unhinged. "This is how it always is — you fucking protest until the last fucking moment and I have to — we haven't done anything in fucking _months,_ I thought that you wanted me to make you like — like the other times —" 

"Maybe I didn't fucking want to do it those times either, did you ever fucking consider that??" you say. You're having difficulty controlling the volume of your voice. None of this feels real.

He furrows his brow, licks his lips. He pauses before he begins a clumsy protest with, "But you —"

"But I what? But I fucking gave in because you bullied me into it?? All fucking right, great!" you choke out with a maniacally forced laugh. "Yeah man, let's use _that_ as a basis for a relationship! Good fucking job!"

"Then why didn't you fucking _say_ —"

" _I DID AND YOU DIDN'T FUCKING LISTEN TO ME, DIRK!_ " you yell. You're past the point of caring if anyone can hear you.

This is the most upset you've ever seen him. You find a certain shadenfreude in it. You look at him in his covered eyes and you think _I hope you feel like shit. I hope you feel even a tenth as miserable as I do._

"But — I —"

"Shut the fuck up," you spit. Your tack turns to outright malice. You're angry and you fucking _hate him_ and all you want is for him is to hurt but you don't feel like you have the power to do anything. He always makes you feel _so fucking powerless._ You're shaking even more badly than you were when this started. "Jesus fucking Christ, how is this so hard for you to understand?"

Dirk completely snaps. "I don't fucking get it, all right!?" he shouts. "I don't fucking know what you're thinking or why you think that way and you expect me to and I can't, okay, I fucking can not do that. Apparently my fucking assumptions are wrong and you never fucking tell me that, you — all you do is expect me to read your fucking mind and get pissed at me whenever I'm wrong, you won't just fucking say it in plain fucking words so I can understand so I — so all I can do is try to fucking guess which either fucking makes it worse or just isn't fucking good enough for you. It doesn't even matter that I'm trying. I don't know how to do this. What the fuck am I supposed to do, Dave?" 

You don't even think you're talking about _this_ anymore. "Oh, so it's fine when you do it, but when _I_ try to live up to your ludicrous bullshit and pretend to not have feelings you —"

"This shit would be a hell of a lot easier if you would pretend you didn't have fucking feelings, but you don't! You have them and just don't fucking bother to tell me why. I don't fucking figure out that I've done something wrong until it's way too fucking late to fix it."

"You don't care why. Even if you did you refuse to understand. You only hear what you want to." Your mouth feels dry. 

"I —"

Your spat is cut short by a knock on your door. It's from the back, by the service elevator, so you know who it must be. You curse and rush to the door without a glance back; when you wrench it open you find Aradia stood on the other side, looking as concerned as she can manage. You appreciate the effort.

"I heard yelling," she summarily informs you.

"Everything is fine," you assure her. "Dirk just cheated at Mario Party."

Aradia Megido is not a fucking idiot. She knows you're lying through your teeth, but she also knows well enough that it means you don't want her involvement. So she acts like she's taken you at face value, and she wishes you a good evening, and she leaves you alone again.

Dirk has already gone back to his room by the time you've returned to the living room. You're not sure whether you're angry he's run away or glad you don't have to carry on the confrontation any further. 

The exhaustion makes sleep easy.


	26. Chapter 26

The most suffocating part of it all proves to be your own guilt.

You don't want to hate Dirk. You really don't. Sometimes your ideas about how you think you should feel end up overpowering your own actual emotions.

There's so much uncertainty to the validity of everything you process. What if your anger at him is just a product of your brain being fucked up? You remember that you loved him, and you don't even think that's changed. All of your passions feel distant, not just that; what if you push him away and regret it when you finally have your life back on track? Is it really a good idea to make decisions based on a kneejerk emotional response in the most unstable point in your life?

You're so frustrated with yourself you can't bear it. All you want is to fucking get over it all — you don't want to be so mad at everything, or sexually frigid, or so pitifully fucking alone despite however much anyone tries to help you. Dirk can't be what you need him to be right now, but he's not _nothing_ to you. You enjoyed his company when it was easier. You desired him so badly when you had any desire at all. You don't want to lose everything just because dealing with all of the fallout of death hasn't come any more naturally to him than it has to you. Part of you _wants_ to blame him, because it's so much easier than accepting any responsibility for yourself, but the immediate shallow gratification can't be worth it long term.

You don't know how to fix this any more than you know how to fix yourself, or anything else, but you feel like you need to try.

So you find yourself in front of his door, eyes bloodshot and encircled by shadows at four in the morning, and you force yourself to knock despite your restless fatigue. When he doesn't answer, you knock again, and you softly call out his name, and you think it might just be easier to let it go after all — but just as you've turned to leave, you hear the handle of Dirk's door rattle, and not long after get a look at his face on the other side. You've been avoiding each other for days, and he doesn't look any better rested than you do. You only notice after the thought that he isn't wearing his shades. You suppose he'd be blind in this dark.

There's a terse moment of silence before either of you speak. You awkwardly clear your throat, close and open your mouth several times as you run through your enormous stable of overthought lines and badly rehearsed conversations before the only word you can ultimately find is, "Sorry."

Dirk doesn't seem to know what to say back any more than you knew how to start. He awkwardly casts his gaze away and his mouth forms into an uncomfortable grimace, and just when you think the discomfort is like to swallow you up, he shrugs. "Sorry for what?"

"For whatever," you say. For once, you feel like you're being honest, however inescapably stupid you suspect this might be. "I don't really give a shit, Dirk. I don't want this. I don't want to be alone." You frown and so does he. With the words out of your mouth, they don't sound particularly profound. Your pathetic selfishness only seems to expand in their silent echo. "Whatever you did, it — it doesn't matter. I fucked up too. Whatever."

Dirk shrugs.

You allow yourself a stupid impulse and pull him into a hug. He gives a bit of a startled response, but eventually eases as much as he can manage — he's still tense as he awkwardly pats you on the back, but it's something. You sit there for a while.

"... If you want to have sex, I'll try," you eventually mumble. You don't know what good trying will do, but you feel like you should.

"S'not really any fun if you're not into it, kid."

While you're sure he meant it as a reassurance, it only manages to make you feel worse. For as long as you're like this, nothing is going to change. You're going to be miserable and he's going to be unsatisfied. The pit of self-loathing and regret in your stomach just seems to grow heavier.

It doesn't feel like there's any option but to deny it all the same. You pull back with a solemn frown and you ask, "Will you come back to bed with me?"

It's not much to ask, so Dirk shrugs. "Yeah," he says, and the two of you return to your room.

You don't know if it makes you feel any better than you did.

 

***

 

"I think I need help," you finally admit.

It's a sudden outburst that erupts rather unexpectedly while you are sat in the living room cramming shitty nachos with Dirk. He looks at you, mouth overly full, and visibly regrets the prematurity of his attempts to swallow. After a moment of discomfort, he asks, "Help with what?"

"My... brain," you slowly reply. "It's been almost three months since she died and I'm still — I dunno." You avoidantly look away. "I'm sort of sick of it."

God, you wish he'd do you the courtesy of ever having a facial expression you could actually read. When his response lags, you are almost immediately flooded with regret and guilt for having even brought the topic up. Of course he doesn't want to hear about this. He wants to pretend that nothing is wrong, like he always does — or are you just making a big fucking deal out of nothing and you're —

"Maybe you just need a vacation," Dirk suggests, oblivious to your pathetic and unsubstantiated internal breakdown. You feel even stupider in the face of his nonchalance. 

"Has this _not_ been a vacation?" you say. "I haven't done any fucking work since... fucking February, even, Jesus. I was slacking off even before this."

Dirk raises an eyebrow. "I mean something that involves actually going somewhere that isn't here. Sitting around all day jacking off isn't a vacation."

You choose to avoid the topic of your recent notable lack of any jacking off. "I dunno," you uselessly reply. "There's so much shit I need to get done, I can't really justify —"

"Well, it's obviously not getting done any time soon and there's no indication that you're going to start if you keep on doing what you're doing, so you may as well drop the pretense and spend some time doing something you like without getting bogged down by your self-loathing horse shit," he says, roundly cutting off your protestations. "You might be able to start doing something if you let yourself feel better first."

"Maybe you're right," you sigh. "I don't know."

Dirk shrugs, and shoves another handful of nachos into his mouth. Ever the paragon of politeness, he speaks with his mouth full. "Do whatever you want. Can't make your decisions for you. Just a suggestion."

 

***

 

TG: so what do you do when youre depressed   
TT: When I'm depressed?   
TG: have you never been depressed   
TT: You realize there's a difference between "depression" and "being sad"?   
TG: yes i am not an idiot   
TT: Do you think of me as a generally depressed person?   
TG: not really   
TT: Are you depressed?   
TG: i guess  
TG: i dunno  
TG: i dont know if its depression or im just sad for  
TG: obvious reasons  
TG: but i thought it would get better and it hasnt  
TG: its kinda fucking me up   
TT: I see.  
TT: I have been depressed, yes.  
TT: Probably between 13 and 25, I was, most of the time.   
TG: really   
TT: Yes.   
TG: you didnt really show it   
TT: I think it just sort of got sublimated into our general discontent with being forced to move to WA.  
TT: It persisted past that point, but I'd learned to function by the time it stopped being acceptable for me to be perpetually miserable.   
TG: yeah uh thats the part im not picking up on  
TG: how do you cope  
TG: with this  
TG: at this point ive basically given up on actually not feeling shitty but i kinda need to be able to go back to being able to do things  
TG: people are counting on me to be able to idk exist   
TT: I'm not really sure I did much of anything when I was a teenager, to be honest.  
TT: I don't know if I have any useful advice for you from that perspective.  
TT: All I really learned was "do what you're told", "smile so men won't criticize you", and "don't try to kiss any ladies".   
TG: well i definitely never learned how to do any of those things   
TT: Quite.  
TT: Well, if you'd like, I can recommend you a therapist.  
TT: I know one in the LA area.   
TG: haha i cant deal with going to a therapist   
TT: Why not?   
TG: its weird   
TT: How is it weird?  
TT: I see a therapist.  
TT: Am I weird?   
TG: yes  
TG: anyway i dont see how it could even help  
TG: its not like i dont know why i feel like shit  
TG: i dont wanna pay thousands of dollars for some old man to tell me  
TG: "hey son were you possibly aware that your fucking mom died"  
TG: "how do you feel about that"  
TG: i feel pretty fuckin bad about it thanks, who do i make the check to   
TT: I don't think this is as new as you think it is.   
TG: what   
TT: I think there are some other things in your life impeding your recovery that probably warrant discussion.   
TG: oh come on  
TG: youre not going to make this about him   
TT: There's no need to be defensive.   
TG: theres nothing for me to be defensive about  
TG: me and dirk are fine  
TG: hes not anything i cant deal with and im definitely not airing that kind of dirty laundry to a stranger   
TT: If you say so.   
TG: basically what im saying is i want drugs   
TT: Don't you have plenty of drugs already?   
TG: not weed drugs like maybe i should do ssris  
TG: or something  
TG: would that help   
TT: I don't know.  
TT: Possibly.  
TT: It's different for everyone.  
TT: You would need a psychiatrist to prescribe you medication.   
TG: so theres no way around seeing a shrink if i want to shoot up on happy pills   
TT: I'm sure there are psychiatrists who will prescribe medication without a decent period of evaluation, but I estimate them to be fairly terrible, and I don't make a habit of socializing with any of them.  
TT: If that is what you want, you're on your own there.   
TG: ugh  
TG: i dont want to be like this any more   
TT: So do you want my recommendation or not?   
TG: ill think about it  
TG: i guess

 

***

 

"... What are you doing?"

You catch a look at Dirk as he steps behind you into the view of your mirror. You finish straightening your tie, and glance back over your shoulder to answer. "I'm going to go outside," you proclaim. "Seriously."

Dirk looks skeptical. "Where? To do what?"

"I hadn't really thought about it," you say, looking back forward to do your cuffs. "Maybe Aradia will want to go to dinner. It's been forever since I ate out anywhere."

"Okay," he slowly responds. He seems hesitant to ask his next question. "You want me to come? I don't have to. That's fine."

You shrug. You're about set for getting dressed, so you turn away from the mirror. "If you want to."

You can see Dirk's eyes narrow even behind his shades. "... Only if _you_ want me to," he carefully replies.

" _Jesus Christ,_ " you say, but you suppose this is your own fault. "Yes, you can come."

Dirk looks at you like he's still not sure that it's okay. It's so ridiculous you almost burst out laughing — shit, that's a change. You let yourself smile a little and _that_ definitely seems to throw him off. "Just get dressed, asshole. I'm gonna go ask Aradia if she wants to come."

Dirk still looks comically reluctant when you leave him behind in your bedroom and traverse the length of the apartment to Aradia's half. You pass through the service elevator hall and knock on her back door; she takes an unusually long time to make it to the door, and you're rather surprised to see that she's already dressed up — unusually so, even. That's a lot more makeup than you've ever seen on her.

"Uh, hey," you say, eyes trailing down to her conspicuously exposed knees. It's not like it's _indecent,_ but have you ever seen Aradia wear a dress above the ankle? "Are you busy?"

There's a moment of awkward pause before Aradia speaks. "Actually, I... have a date, tonight," she says.

You brain kinda blanks out. "What? You have... a date?" you repeat uncomprehendingly. You don't quite catch what an asshole you sound like until the words are already out of your mouth.

"... Yes," she slowly replies. "I can cancel it."

"What, no — you don't have to — I just — uh. I didn't know you dated."

"I don't."

You spend a moment just staring blankly at her until you recall that you are probably expected to have some sort of response to that. It's a struggle to find a coherent one. You're not supposed to pry, right? _Jesus,_ but you're curious. "Well, uh — have fun, I guess," is what you ultimately settle on. You hope that wasn't too awkward.

Aradia nods mechanically. "If you're in need of company, I've been told that Jade is back in town."

"Really?" you ask. "I didn't hear that from her."

"She told me she could never get through to your phone. I speculated that you had set it to reject incoming calls."

"... Well, yeah." You should probably turn that off at some point. It probably only exacerbates your isolation.

Aradia continues to stand at the door until you slip back into discomfort. This is _weird._ "Uh, I'll go then," you say, and return to your apartment.

Another bizarre surprise is that you find Dirk actually wearing a suit. You didn't tell him to put it on, but he did — the amount of tryhard suddenly emanating from this guy is unreal, but you're not about to complain. You even decide that you're not going to make fun of him for it, which is obviously more than he expected; when you find him stood in your bedroom, he falls into a ludicrously defensive posture you'd almost expect if you were threatening to punch him in the face.

"Where's Aradia?" he quickly asks, as if attempting to preempt your criticism.

"Going on a _date,_ " you answer.

"... _Aradia?_ "

"I know, right?"

Dirk seems to relax when it becomes clear you don't intend to berate him for anything. Either that, or from the apparent prospect of not having to go anywhere after all. "So are we not going out?"

"I still wanna go somewhere," you say. "Jade's apparently in town now, maybe I'll ask her."

Dirk bristles reflexively. You sigh.

"Jade's not a threat to you, dude. She's a much nicer person than either of us combined and I'm not going to leave you for her. She's actually in America like five weeks out of the year and I'd like to see her. Calm down."

You're not sure saying that had the intended effect, but he doesn't protest nonetheless. He grumbles his reluctant assent.

"Would it make you feel better if I invited people who aren't Jade?" you ask.

"Who else would you even invite?"

"... I just had the stupidest idea in the universe."

 

***

 

It's difficult to picture any moment in your life where you would have predicted _"attempting to get Eridan Ampora laid"_ as a thing you would be doing, but _here you are._

The five of you — Dirk, Jade, Terezi, Eridan and yourself — are sat in a booth of the seediest bar in downtown LA you could find — so far, anyway. This is the third. Or was it the fourth? You're not even sure you're still in LA anymore. None of you particularly care.

"Look at her, over there," you say, gesturing to a sufficiently feminine shape sat alone at the bar. "She looks easy. I guess." You don't have any clue about how easy this woman is, but you're just gonna go with it. You're sure he needs the perceived handicap, imagined or not.

"Ehhh..." Eridan says, expression contorting in mild distaste. "She's not really my —"

"Beggars can't be choosers, Eridan," you inform him. 

"I've tried to talk up five ladies tonight and not a _single_ one wants to smooch on me, I don't know if this is going to _work!_ Do people even _do_ bar hookups anymore!?"

"Well, they're certainly not here for the quality decor."

"I tttthhhinnk what you need is, a WINGMAN," Terezi slurs. Terezi is nearly black out fucking drunk, and has been since your first stop. You're not sure if she's actually this drunk or hamming it up, because this is some ridiculous nonsense.

She's also wearing a low cut dress and no bra and it is impossible for you to look at anything _but_ her tits. This problem resolves itself for you when Terezi topples over into Jade's lap with a horrible lurch.

"Don't barf on me!!!" Jade yells, recoiling. Terezi only responds by tittering and burying her face into Jade's rack. Jade seems to be resigned to her fate.

"Terezi is right," you confidently proclaim. "You just need someone to back you up on your game." You clap Dirk on the shoulder.

Dirk is immediately perturbed. "Why the _hell_ are you touching _me_ —"

"Who better than to show Eridan the ways of lady killing than _you,_ Dirk," you drawl, a sloppy grin on your face. From the sounds Terezi is making, she thinks this is as great an idea as you do. 

"Yeessss!!!" Terezi shrieks. You're pretty sure she's on the ground now.

Dirk opens his mouth to protest but you cut him off by dragging him to his feet; this is a bit of an effort, given that he weighs approximately eight thousand pounds more than you and you aren't terrible coordinated even when you _aren't_ drunk but you manage it _and_ the feat of pulling Eridan along with you as well.

Before the either of them know it, you have them stood on either side of a decidedly startled woman at the bar. You are entirely unsure if this is even the same woman you pointed out earlier, but that matters precisely not at all. You clap them both on the back and leave them to return to your booth; you can just hear them from where you're sat. Terezi must have managed to get up off the ground because she throws herself onto you the moment you return, laughing maniacally.

"Um... can I help you?" the woman asks, looking from red-faced sweaty Eridan to Dirk with his deathly stare. She seems thoroughly unsettled.

"This man wants to have sex with you," Dirk gruffly states, expression matched to his emotionless monotone.

The woman takes several moments to respond, as if the bare upfront honesty of the words haven't quite processed immediately. "Ex... excuse me?" she responds, dumbstruck.

Dirk repeats himself word for word, but that doesn't seem to help much. Eridan looks mortified. Jade has joined Terezi in the laughing pile on top of you. It's a bit difficult to breathe.

Unsurprisingly, the woman swiftly concludes that it is time to leave, and makes her way to the exit with a huff. Eridan's eyes are bugging out of his skull and Dirk doesn't quite seem to understand how what he said was _that_ offensive.

"You were supposed to help me kiss that lady!!!" Eridan hollers, gesticulating wildly. "You are a SHIT WINGMAN!!!!"

"The fuck was I supposed to say?" Dirk defensively responds.

"Something that WASN'T THE THING YOU JUST SAID!"

"This wasn't _my_ idea —"

"THEN YOU SHOULDN'T HA—"

As soon as you notice the two very large and very angry bouncers heading in the direction of Eridan's hysterical shouting, you come to terms with the fact that it is time to take your leave. You inform Jade that she's going to have to carry Terezi and hurry over to collect Dirk and Eridan. They don't need much convincing to go when they get a look at Tubbs and Beefhunk heading their way. 

Before long you're back on the streets again, and you have to lean on Dirk for support. You're not _that_ drunk, but discombobulated enough that it's better safe than sorry.

It's becoming pretty clear that the bar route isn't getting you anywhere. As the group of you staggers down the sidewalk, Jade announces the end of a fruitless Yelp phone search. "There are no more bars with less than three stars left in a five mile radius," she says. You're not sure whether she's disappointed or relieved.

"Shit, let's just go to a strip club, then," you say. "We can at least get this kid a lap dance."

Dirk is repulsed, Jade is reluctant, Eridan looks terrified and Terezi is very clear about how that is the best idea she's ever heard. The two of you combined — probably Terezi alone, honestly — have enough enthusiasm to override the willpower of the rest and before you know it you've set off to your next destination. Terezi makes a point of singing, off-key, about how she "can't wait to see some bigole titties."

There are no other lyrics to the song. It lasts the entire duration of your walk all the same.

Luckily for her, you suppose, there is indeed an abundance of bigole titties on display in the club. They're a bit difficult to process with the flashing lights and ear-drum-destroyingly loud music overloading your suite of senses, but you survive. Your group manages to find a rather secluded booth in the corner of the club — probably a fuck booth, honestly, and you're wary of the suspicious discoloration in the seats.

By the time the lot of you have noticed that Terezi is no longer with you, she's already returned — with a friend in tow. A friend with enormous fake tits in a G-string and enough makeup to knock out of a clown. It only takes one glance to make Dirk look like he wants to throw up.

"Heeeeyyyy!!" Terezi shrieks, sliding into her seat next to Jade. "I found a stripper!"

"Um, yeah, you did," Jade awkwardly remarks. She is obviously not as comfortable with being in a titty bar as Terezi, nor nearly as drunk. She doesn't seem to know what to do.

The booth you chose isn't quite nearly large enough to fit the five of you _and_ a stripper with a grotesquely inflated fake ass, so she simply decides to make herself a spot by sitting directly on top of Eridan. 

"My name is Krystal Kandi Danger," the stripper coos, leaning against Eridan with an arm around his shoulders. It's all you can do to stop yourself from breaking down laughing at the look on Eridan's face. "My friend Terzey here tells me that you're a virgin. I like that."

"H-hi Krystal Kandi Danger," Eridan bleats. His hands are balled into sweaty fists at his sides. "It's me, Eri."

"Eri? That's a sweet name."

"Actually, it's Eridan. My full name is Eridan Ampora. But people call me Eri. Actually, they don't, but — I call me Eri."

"Okay, Eri," she says, fluttering her eyelashes. She is obviously not listening to a word that he says. "How about you and I find somewhere nice and quiet to get to know each other?"

"Heh, heh, um — I'm not sure there's anywhere quiet in this club so —"

"We can go back stage. I'll show you the dressing rooms. It'll be fun."

"I —"

"C'mon, let's go!" Krystal cheerily urges him, jumping to her feet. You've never seen a woman with assets so large with so little jiggle. That shit's like solid rock on both ends. 

Eridan understandably balks, but Krystal is having none of his hesitation. She cheerily grabs him by the wrists and pulls him to his feet, and before he knows what's hit him, she's leading him away.

"Holy shit," you mutter, disbelieving. "Really? Did that just happen? How much did you pay her?"

"Nothing!" Terezi exclaims. "I asked her if she would fuck my retarded cousin for his birthday and she said yes!" 

" _Your retarded cousin —_ "

"He's wearing a cape, Dave."

"Are you sure she's not just going to stab him and steal his kidneys?" Jade mutters. She cranes her neck around to try to get a glimpse of Eridan disappearing into the crowd, but he's already gone. At least one of you is actually concerned for his wellbeing.

Dirk makes up for that meager show of compassion with a scathing remark. "Wouldn't be much of a loss."

"Dirk, that's not nice," Jade chides him. "Eridan is a good kid."

"Jade, he's like... thirty years old," you remind her.

"... Oh, yeah. He is... oh god. I need to be way drunker than I am," Jade somberly proclaims. She pushes her way to the bar past Terezi, who probably needs to be way more sober than she is.

"I want to leave," Dirk likewise announces. His patience has evidently run thin even past his valiant effort to not be a cock to you. "This is no longer even slightly amusing and I don't want to see any more fucking titties."

Much to his annoyance, Terezi immediately lurches over your lap (jamming her bony fucking razorblade knee uncomfortably close to your balls in the process) to grab onto Dirk's wrist when he gets up to leave. "Noooo, don't go yeeeeettt," she incoherently wails.

You freeze up in anxious anticipation the moment Terezi touches Dirk. He goes completely rigid and you can feel the concealed death in his covered eyes. You expect him to fucking punch her and you're shocked when he doesn't.

"We can't leave until Eridan is back," you tell him, your tone laced with a warning edge. He only sits back down after giving you the most begrudging look he can muster.

You are now in an awkward position with Terezi wedged between the two of you. She's still touching Dirk, which you can tell he doesn't like. "You're really hot," Terezi groggily slurs, staring up at him with half-lidded eyes and a sloppy grin.

"I'm not going to fuck you," Dirk assures her.

You sputter. " _Dirk_ —"

"I'm not."

Terezi is unperturbed, and, apparently, undeterred. "You've got a biiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiig di—"

Dirk pushes her into your lap instead. This time, it's her elbow that stabs into your gut, taking the wind out of you. "Gk— f— _Dir_ —"

"Fuckin' had it with this thirsty bitch," Dirk spits, looking at you and Terezi like he's eying a feisty leper. "Don't want anything to do with your nasty fish pit."

"Fish pit!!" Terezi hollers, splaying herself out over your lap. " _Fish pit!!! Hahahahahah!!!_ "

That evidently did not have the desired effect. Dirk adopts a furiously constipated expression. Terezi sticks her tongue out at him, and then in an act of mindboggling stupidity, reaches her hand out to grasp the back of your neck and kisses you.

You don't know what it is that does it — the surprise, the foreign softness of her lips, the raunchy alcohol taste of her mouth, Dirk's instant reaction of psychotic jealousy, or maybe it's just kissing a girl after so long without — but you immediately start to pop a boner. You can't believe it. You're so shocked by the rush of blood to your crotch that you can't even properly react to the kiss.

"What the _FUCK,_ " Dirk sputters. He throws his hands in the air, in absence of a license to pummel Terezi. "What is this! What is this _fucking_ shit!"

"Sooooooorry, did I make you mad?" Terezi titters. She's evidently just sober enough to recognize that it's in her best interest to drag her ass off your lap and put your body between her and Dirk.

You check and you're not imagining things. You have a boner. It's only like, a little bit of one, _but it's real, you don't have fucking erectile dysfunction, holy shit_ —

"I have a boner," you announce, and you don't think either of them grasp the gravity of this declaration.

"Don't touch him —"

"I'm not touching him! I'm not touching him!"

"Guys, I have a boner," you repeat.

"You were touching him!"

"Am not!"

You're not sure which of the three of you is more surprised when you pull Dirk down into a kiss.

This is a terrible idea. You know this is a terrible idea. You crawl into his lap anyway. You are so desperate to hold onto this that you just let go. That's what you came here for, wasn't it?

Dirk is understandably reticent — not only because of how suddenly you've pounced upon him, but because of Terezi's shrill and giddily clapping presence — but after you've made damn clear that you are for real, he goes with it. His hands slip around your waist, and you allow his tongue to part your lips and _god_ have you missed being able to do this. You missed wanting him, wanting _anything,_ and while it's not even close to the kind of blinding desire you've felt in the past, it's something, and that's enough.

You forget Terezi is there. You don't care. You straddle Dirk's waist and press your body against him as his growls into your mouth and wanders your skin with his hands — the coldness of his touch sends sparks down your spine as he slides his hand up your shirt, and the heat in your groin intensifies as he strokes over your thighs and squeezes your ass.

He shifts a palm to grope roughly at your junk, as if to verify that this is actually happening. You hope the painful throb of your dick against your now too-tight pants is answer enough. 

You figure this has probably reached the point where this needs to be taken elsewhere. You extract yourself from Dirk's grasp, to his flustered dismay; he's noticeably relieved when you grab him by the wrist to pull him to his feet. Terezi, however, seems to be rather put off by losing her view of the show. Too bad for her.

You lead Dirk by the hand through the bustling crowd in the direction of the half-broken neon sign hung above the entrance to the bathrooms. You stumble, without really looking, into the first door, and pull him back to the furthest of the rather long row of stalls. You're quick to pin Dirk up against the door of the stall as soon as you've locked it securely, but you find him oddly reluctant to reciprocate — you pull back and, agitated, look to him for an explanation.

"You really want to do this?" he asks you.

"I have a fucking boner," you inform him, oddly scornful. "If I get it out of my system maybe I'll get it back _into_ my system."

Dirk seems a bit dubious, but you're determined enough to cut off his protests that he loses track of his meager will to resist. By the time you've undone his belt and shoved your hand down the front of his pants, he's kissing you back in earnest. 

The rush of actually _wanting_ this is recursively intensifying. Maybe your judgment is a little murky, and maybe you won't feel this way when it's done, but _god,_ you're fucking thrilled that you do. When Dirk turns the tables to take control and shoves your body against the dirty wall of the bathroom, you're relieved.

"Are you carrying lube?" you ask, breath heavy. _Shit,_ it's been so long since you've been down to fuck that it wouldn't be surprising if he decided to save the pocket space. He's got your pants awkwardly pushed down around your knees and you can feel the hardness of still-clothed dick pressed up against your ass. You are going to be sorely disappointed if you leave this nasty bathroom without having been thoroughly fucked.

Dirk elects to answer that with a dreadfully cold and wet finger up your ass. "I'm an optimistic man," he remarks.

You suppress a gasp as you clench around the discomforting intrusion, but the temperature acclimates quickly — and he's thankfully not set on dwelling in the awkward prep stage for long. It'd probably be better for you if he did, honestly, considering how long it's been since you had _anything _in your ass, let alone his enormous fucking cock. You're not patient or sober enough to care, though.__

__He works his fingers quickly to stretch you out as you anxiously brace yourself against the wall. By the time he's pulled out, you know for certain it hasn't been enough, but you don't complain. You do your best to relax as he fishes his cock out of his pants — you crane your neck over your shoulder to get a look at it and _god_ are you ready to just fucking take it already. It's thick and heavy in his palm as he slicks it with lube, and you push back eagerly and desperately and bite your lip and ball your fists against the wall until he's finally, finally got the head against you and starts to push inside._ _

__It's almost as bad as the first time. You'd acclimated to it after months of regular sex, but it's like you've lost all your hard earned progress. The sensation of him inside of you is overpowering and overwhelming and painful but so, so fucking _good_ — he's taking it slow, since he can tell from your labored breaths how fucking intense this is, but it's not much of a help. You don't want it to._ _

__"Fuck me," you breathlessly demand. Your tongue catches the drool running from your lip._ _

__You can feel the weight of his body against your back as he brusquely thrusts into you, slams you against the wall — it's exactly what you asked for and exactly what you needed and the burn permeates through your body until you feel weak and dumb. Your knees tremble and threaten to give way when he digs his fingers into your hips and slowly, painfully pulls back; your fingers scrape against the filthy wall as you struggle to hold yourself up. It's probably only his hand low on your stomach that supports you when he abruptly moves again, filling you in a harsh motion that draws a cry from your lips._ _

__"Fuck, I missed this," he growls against your neck._ _

__You can't say you disagree._ _

__It's been so long since you've so much as jacked off that every sensation feels heightened, even through the haze of the alcohol. You feel so painfully tight around him and your dick is throbbing and every teasing brush of his hand against you is almost too much to bear. You push back up against him and back down onto him and bite down onto your lip until it bleeds and the pain runs over the edge of pleasure._ _

__Dirk gradually picks up the pace of his motions, but the physical reality of the subsidence of the friction inside of you seems to stand in harsh contrast to your own perception of his presence and rhythm. It's difficult to retain your coherence; you feel like you're on the edge even though you're nowhere close and there's no crest or end to the intoxication. You press the side of your face against the wall, long past caring about god knows what's been splattered across it, and you _melt._ The hard thickness of his cock spreads you apart until you feel broken and impossibly filled. He's got his fist on your dick now, his grip as forcefully intense as his deep thrusts inside of you, and you are just robbed of any ability to do anything besides sit there, gasping, drooling, and _take it._ _ _

__You're rather caught off guard when Dirk seizes and stops and then jerks erratically, pulsing inside of you with a heavy breath — it's not often that Dirk finishes before you do, and you're nowhere near finished. You're actually a little surprised when he pulls out, despite being fully cognizant of the fact he just busted a load inside of you. That fact is all the more disarming when the uncomfortable wetness in your ass is reintroduced to the cold air of the club bathroom._ _

__"Shit," he mumbles as he pulls back, drawing with him a messy trail. You awkwardly kick off your pants, since you kind of want to avoid dripping jizz into them, and shakily turn around to face him._ _

__You have to lean yourself against the wall to support yourself, weak as your legs are. "I'm not done yet," you slur, licking your dry lips. You figure that was probably self-evident from the look of you._ _

__"You want me to get my trillion dollar pants dirty?" he sardonically asks, gaze trailing down to your still painfully erect dick._ _

__"Ruin them," you demand._ _

__While you're not sure whether he's more eager about sucking you off or the prospect of being able to fuck up his terrible rich boy pants, he appears to gladly comply. You release a rattly sigh as Dirk drops to his knees in front of you and braces his hands against your trembling thighs. His breath is hot against your tender skin and he hesitates just long enough to get you to look at him and the predatory smolder of his eyes, and your chest seizes with a peculiar fear that washes away as quickly as it comes._ _

__Your gaze drifts to the ceiling as he slowly takes you into his mouth, fingers curled around the base of your dick. He's teasing you. Your fingers tangle themselves into his hair of their own volition, because this is how he's trained you, to beg for him with your every thought and action — he complies only when you make it clear that you need him so badly you've abandoned even the pretense of control._ _

__His tongue circles around you as he shallowly sucks at the head. Your hips tilt up into him, petitioning for a release close yet so painfully distant, and receive only the slightest accession. Your breath runs ragged in time with your mounting desperation, but he works at his own pace, not yours._ _

__Dirk pulls away his hand to steady your hips, and in place of the lost stimulation he allows you to push up against the back of his throat. He's always made you envious — god knows you've tried to suppress your gag reflex. He makes it look effortless as he leans forward until his lips are almost flush with your body._ _

__" _God,_ " you breathe, pulsing painfully against the oppressive heat of his throat. You don't have to look at him to see the smug satisfaction he derives from the tone of your voice. _ _

__That seems to be enough. He draws back and then he slides back down, building a concentrated and merciful rhythm. You release your grip from his hair because if you didn't have your hands free to grip the dividing wall of the stall you'd certainly fall to your knees._ _

__Your legs naturally part as he slips his fingers around to play at your uncomfortably wet entrance; it's a rather substantial relief to have something back inside, filling you. It's too awkward a position for him to finger you properly, and it's not as overwhelming a sensation as his enormous dick, obviously, but it stops the nasty, drippy feeling, and the sensation of his finger rubbing against your prostate certainly doesn't hurt. He moves his fingers in shallow thrusts as he works your dick in his mouth, and you finally feel yourself drawing closer, closer, close —_ _

__You freeze when the sound of the bathroom door swinging open interrupts your concentration. You grab Dirk by the hair again to stop him, and he looks up at you with confusion when your dick is wrenched out of his mouth. "Shh," you chide him, willing yourself to stand deathly still. Your heart hammers in your chest and at once you feel painfully sober._ _

__You wait as the sound of footsteps approaches your stall. They stop, and then you hear the door to the stall directly next to you open. Your heart feels as if it's about to burst from your throat as you quietly, quietly wait for the guy to finish and leave. The sound of his piss beside you is deafening._ _

__... Wait. You don't remember seeing any urinals._ _

__"... Dave, is that you?" _she_ suddenly asks. _It's fucking Terezi.__ _

__You remain speechless until Terezi's nigh-unending stream of urine comes to a halt, and your response is appropriately stilted. "Uh... yeah," you answer._ _

__"Oh, okay. Have fun," she says. She flushes the toilet and leaves._ _

__There is a long and awkward moment of silence before either of you do anything. "She didn't wash her hands," you finally say._ _

__Dirk looks up at you with an agitated expression and a conspicuous trail of precum traveling down his chin. He can evidently see how shaken you are. "Dave, if you had a problem with being caught, why did you decide to fuck me in the women's bathroom?"_ _

__"Sure I would have an answer to that if I weren't stupid fucking drunk?" you mumble, slumping against the wall. You really need to not be standing anymore._ _

__"... Well, do you want me to finish or not?"_ _

__"Yeah, I guess."_ _

__Dirk gives you an exasperated sigh and returns to work — fingers up your ass and dick down his throat. However taken out of the moment you may have been, you're quick to forget. His motions turn aggressive and harsh; he moves his head quickly, jabs into you forcefully, and the involuntary noises it earns him seem to readily encourage his pace. You were tortuously close before you stopped so it doesn't take long to build back up to where you'd left off, and when he senses you're near the edge he sinks down and takes you over, and you _come,_ inflamed by the denial and the adrenaline you come, forcefully in disorienting waves and you lose track of yourself until the final moments after you're finished panting and spilling down the back of his throat._ _

__Dirk draws back and wipes his mouth on the back of his hand, and apparently decides to lick his fingers clean while he's at it. You collect your senses long enough to grope blindly for a wad of toilet paper to wipe your sticky ass and legs with, and then your discarded pants, when you discover you evidently were not quick enough to spare them from your nasty ass drip. _Ugh,_ that's going to stain. _ _

__"We probably ought to go home," Dirk suggests after watching you spend a painfully long amount of time attempting to scrub spunk gunk off of your pants without success. You accept your defeat, nod your agreement and hope that the darkness of the club shrouds the worst of it._ _

__You have to brace yourself on him to walk. You're not as drunk as you were, but you've picked up a bit of a fuck limp and you were tired enough as it is. Fortunately, everyone seems to have gathered back at the booth, in body if not in mind — Jade is the only person who appears to still be conscious._ _

__She looks at you with bleary eyes and you are stricken with what is probably an entirely unnecessary flood of guilt. Did Terezi tell her what you were doing? It's probably obvious, anyway — _Jesus fuck, it's not like she doesn't already know you have sex with Dirk_ —_ _

__You self-consciously extract yourself from Dirk's side anyway and slump into the booth next to passed-out Eridan. "How's he doing?"_ _

__Evidently, not that passed out. "A woman had sex with me," Eridan incoherently mutters to himself._ _

__"... Yeah," is all Jade says._ _

__You're not sure you can manage the awkward discomfort around Jade for long, even if it's entirely imagined. After guiltily mulling it over, you ask, "You mind if I jet? I got shit to do."_ _

__Jade nods. "That's all right. I'll stick around until these guys wake up and make sure they get home safe."_ _

__"Thanks, Jade," you say, and you go._ _

__

__***_ _

__

__The cab back home is spent in silence. Neither of you are sure what to say, and when you get home, you're too tired to make an effort. You don't remember falling asleep._ _

__It doesn't feel like you've slept at all the next you rouse. You have a mild headache and your throat is awfully dry; you groggily register that your consciousness is due to Dirk nudging you awake._ _

__"What?" you miserably ask, blinking in the light. It must be late. Dirk sat up on the bed beside you, watching you with guarded eyes. He's not wearing his shades, you notice._ _

__"Wanted to know if you were awake yet."_ _

__"No," you answer. You cover your face in your pillow._ _

__"... Are you sure you're okay with this?" Dirk asks after a time. You look up from your pillow wearily._ _

__"Okay with what?"_ _

__"What we did last night."_ _

__You finally give up on the pretense of going back to sleep and roll onto your side to look at him. "Why wouldn't I be?"_ _

__"You were drunk," he says, expression hard._ _

__"That's nothing new," you say. From the agitated twitch in his face you decide it's probably best to not be so evasive. You know what he's getting at and you know he knows you know. You sigh. "I mean... I remember it," you mumble. "I said I wanted to fuck."_ _

__"You've indicated you wanted to fuck before and turned out to not want to fuck."_ _

__"... Those were different."_ _

__He says nothing, but you can tell he's not convinced that they were. He's come to second guess every assumption he's ever made about you and it's like starting from square one. You've put him so on edge you're not sure you're going to be able to so much as touch each other again without it becoming a fucking _ordeal._ That you should feel guilty about this is laughable, but the fact remains that you do._ _

__"I'm sorry, Dirk," you tell him. It feels pointless and you feel pointless. "I just want to get past this."_ _

__"... Yeah, me too," he answers, oddly forthcoming._ _

__You reach out to him and he settles back down into bed beside you, quiet. It feels good to close your eyes and block out the light._ _


	27. Chapter 27

gallowsCalibrator [GC] began pestering turntechGodhead [TG]

GC: HEY  
GC: HEY DAVE   
TG: hey terezi  
TG: whats up   
GC: WHY ARENT YOU ANSWERING YOUR PHONE??   
TG: oh ive had my phone off for a while  
TG: i just turned it on  
TG: sorry  
TG: do you need something   
GC: OH I JUST ASSUMED YOUD WANT TO GET A LAWSUIT ROLLING   
TG: uhhh  
TG: why   
GC: OH DID YOU NOT KNOW ABOUT THIS   
TG: about what   
GC: UM JEEZ  
GC: WELL YOU MIGHT WANT TO TURN ON NBC   
TG: why would i do that for any reason   
GC: YOU KNOW HOW THE TONIGHT SHOW WAS HYPING UP SOME DARK CELEBRITY SECRET EXPOSURE OR WHATEVER   
TG: no i didnt  
TG: generally dont make a habit of knowing anything about anything to do with nbc   
GC: MAYBE YOU SHOULD BECAUSE IT TURNED OUT IT WAS ABOUT YOU!   
TG: jesus christ is leno that fucking desperate for ratings now   
GC: I GUESS  
GC: I DONT KNOW JAY LENO IS JUST SORT OF A SHITTY GUY ALL AROUND   
TG: brb

You shove your phone into your pocket and make your way to the living room. You turn on the television and flip through the channels until find what you're looking for.

Jay Leno and his stupid fucking chin are sat across from the most decrepit looking creature you've ever had the misfortune of laying your eyes upon. You don't recognize her at all, but who she must be is immediately obvious to you.

"Dave was such a good little child," the extremely elderly woman prattles on. "It's a _pity_ he seems to have been lead _astray_ from the _Lord._ "

At this point, you're already so low down and you've already been kicked so many times that it doesn't even... register. You've become _jaded_ to this. It's become old and repetitive and _mundane_. It's just one more fucking thing on a pile of miserable fucking coincidences, poised as if in a divine conspiracy to ruin you utterly.

Your eyes glaze over as you watch her pendulous jowls sway beneath her tremulous jaw. "I've come forward because..." She coughs raucously, in alarming contrast to her feeble voice. "I've come forward because my _conscience_ cannot _allow_ me to stand by any longer while _such sinful acts_ are being _perpetrated_ up—"

You turn off the television.

TG: i cant watch this   
GC: IM SORRY DAVE  
GC: HOWEVER I AM PREPARED AND WILLING TO DISTRIBUTE LEGAL RUINATION   
TG: i dont know if  
TG: thats going to be possible   
GC: WHY  
GC: IS WHAT SHES SAID TRUE >:?   
TG: that  
TG: depends  
TG: what shit has she said about me so far   
GC: UM NOTHING MUCH REALLY  
GC: SHES CLAIMING TO BE YOUR FOSTER PARENT  
GC: IS THAT NOT A LIE??   
TG: uh it might not be  
TG: im not entirely sure   
GC: DID YOU HAVE A FOSTER PARENT   
TG: um i had a lot  
TG: ok long story short my mom wasnt my real mom and im adopted   
GC: OH OK   
TG: she hasnt said anything like  
TG: really bad has she   
GC: I DONT THINK SO  
GC: SHE JUST TALKED ABOUT HOW SHE GOT YOU AND WHAT YOU WERE LIKE AS A BABY  
GC: THIS IS A TWO PART INTERVIEW APPARENTLY I THINK THE IMPLICATION IS THAT THE REAL DIRT IS DROPPING ON MONDAY   
TG: fuck   
GC: DO YOU HAVE ANY IDEA WHAT SHES GOING TO SAY??   
TG: yeah i do  
TG: and its bad  
TG: i need to deal with this   
GC: IM SORRY DAVE   
TG: its not your fault  
TG: listen ill get back to you later theres something i have to find out first

turntechGodhead [TG] ceased pestering gallowsCalibrator [GC]

That explains the fourteen missed calls.

When you stand up from the sofa, you feel like you're in a daze. You walk across the apartment space to your bedroom quickly and with determination, your pulse heavy in your ears. The door is slightly ajar. You push it open to find Dirk sat on your bed, apparently reading something you couldn't even begin to care about.

"Did you do this?" you ask, your voice as even as you can manage. Keeping a healthy distance between you and him seems wise.

Dirk looks up from his book, eyebrow raised. He certainly doesn't seem concerned. "Do what?"

"Seriously," you start. You clench your fists. "Was it because I wouldn't fuck you? Was it because you finally got me to fuck you? Did you leak it before or after we talked?"

Irritation creeps into his tone. "What the fuck are you on about?"

"Come the fuck on, Dirk!" you snap. You're sick of this. You're so fucking sick of this!

"Nevermind, I'm done with this," he says, looking away from you to resume a facade of absorption in his reading, as if performing a grotesque mockery of your own exasperated weariness to a repeated topic. Your teeth grind.

"Remember Mrs. Wallsmith?" you ask him, struggling to keep the tremor from your voice. 

Still uninterested. Doesn't look at you. "No."

"Well, she remembered me," you say. You lick your lips. Your tongue is dry. "On television. And on Monday, she's going to remember you."

That makes him stop. "I —"

You don't allow him the chance to speak. "You fucking said that all of them were gone — but you knew she was alive, didn't you? You leaked the tape, too, didn't you?" you hurriedly blurt out, stumbling over your words in your rush. "I didn't want to believe it but I — any time you don't get what you want, this —"

"I —"

"And the time at Christmas when you —"

"Dave," he stops you, voice raised ever so slightly. "I didn't fucking do this."

You feel ridiculous. You feel hysterical. You have no idea how to process any of the emotions you're feeling, let alone express them. "How do I know that's true? How the fuck is it just a coincidence that these things keep happening!?"

"You're being paranoid," he says. "What could I possibly have to gain from having done this?"

Your mouth opens and closes. You don't know. You have absolutely no fucking idea and it drives you _insane_ because _everything fucking points to him having done it anyway_. There's nothing he could have possibly gotten out of doing any of it but it keeps happening, over and over and over and over again so what the fuck else are you supposed to think?

"Because you want to hurt me," is all you can come up with. It's the only explanation that fits anything he does. He acts like he's fucking oblivious but the simpler answer is that he _just wants you to feel pain_ and you don't understand why but the alternative is random fucking chance — that he's really, honestly unaware — that there's nothing you can —

"I don't."

That's all he says. That's his only defense.

You wanted a confrontation. You want to scream and yell and hit him and let it all fucking go but all he says is _I don't_. He doesn't argue back, he doesn't get upset — he looks you in the eye and lets your anger make you feel worthless.

You can't do this. You can't be here. You turn around and flee from the room; he calls out for you to stop but you ignore him, grab your keys off where you left them on the kitchen counter and leave. You bypass the elevator because you couldn't stand the wait, and go down, and down, and down and down and down the stairs until you're too fucking tired to do it anymore and you collapse into the corner of the stairwell and stop.

It would be really, really easy. You look down the seemingly endless spiral of stairs and you think of how fucking easy it would be. It would be easier than going back up and having to face him, or going back down and having to face anything else in the outside world. You could do it and it would make everything so much fucking simpler.

But you can't, and you don't. You take out your phone and slowly go through all the panicked messages your family and friends have sent you. With trembling hands, you pick through them one by one and send them reassuring texts filled with lies about your wellbeing — all but for Meenah, who left you an ominous directive to come into the production studio tomorrow morning. You sit in the stairwell until you've caught a much as your bearings as you can manage and then you go down to the garage, get into your car and drive.

 

***

 

All you want is a fight and you go to Meenah because you know she'll always, always give you one.

It's just like her to fucking hound you at your lowest. She's going to spit and yell at you and you want it, you fucking need the confrontation and it's not even about her — you're prepared to meet her nagging chiding with all of the fucking invectives you've been holding back for years. _Fuck that,_ you think. _Fuck her._ You're not going to let her have it on her terms.

You pull into the resident-only parking lot of Meenah's apartment complex and forget to lock your car.

You still have an entry card to the building from when you've had to babysit Feferi, so you let yourself into the high rise and blow through the lobby without a word to anyone. You angrily jab the up button for the elevator and anxiously wait for the carriage to arrive to take you to the penthouse floor on which this horrible fucking bitch resides.

She's not expecting you. You hammer loudly on her door until she finally comes to answer, and the momentary look of surprise on her face gives you the confidence to shoulder past her into the apartment.

Meenah is quick to transform her alarm into a predatory glower and makes a show of false humility with a dark smile. "Been doing well, Dave?" she asks, closing the door behind her. "Get you anything to drink?"

You spin on your heel in the short entry hall. You're fucking seething, hands balled into fists. "Cut the shit," you curtly instruct her. 

She at least does you that mercy. The pretense and false air of civility drops and her words drip off her tongue like venom. "You know what I want," Meenah growls, stepping forward from the doorway. Her eyes are trained on you like a laser sight.

"My mother died, you cunt," you spit acerbically. "I'm not writing a fucking script this year, I can't do it, and even if I did it would be _awful_ so —"

Meenah's face contorts into a expression of derisive perplexity. "No, you fuckin' _idiot._ What, you think I give a shit about a script? Whatever, cry about your stupid drunk of a mother all you want. This is about the company. It always has been."

... The realization only just begins to dawn on you and you feel like a _complete fucking idiot._

"Dave," Meenah says, smiling at your shock with something so oddly resembling fondness. "Are you fucking _retarded?_ Did you think — _God._ What did you think this was _about?_ Did you think that old bag came out of _nowhere?_ "

"That was —"

_God. You're so fucking stupid. You're so, so, so, so, so fucking STUPID — you walked into this and you didn't even —_

Her words come more quickly than you can process. "Do you think she has a reason to _care_ what you do in the middle of the night? She's out there because I'm _paying_ her to be, and until I get what I want, the stories are just going to keep coming." She snaps her fingers and you jump. "Listen, I'm sure you've figured out how this is going down by now and it's all very simple. If you agree to give me the company by 12:30 PM on Monday, Mrs. Wallsmith is going to go back into the recording studio and she's gonna throw you a softball. She's gonna unearth some embarrassing baby photos and tell a few stories about how you used to be a big bedwetter and come out against your drug use. The end. I don't get what I want, she tells the world about your brother. It's your decision."

Your mouth opens and closes. "How did you —"

She looks at you like you're stupid. "You told me," she says.

"What the fuck? When did I tell you that I was —" Saying the words out loud feels like an admission of guilt, however guilty you are. "I never would have said that to you."

"I knew you were adopted. You told me your birth name. It wasn't hard to put two and two together. It took some digging to find anything to use against you, but I've known for a while. I was just waiting for the right time."

Oh, _god._ You'd forgotten you'd even told her any of that. When did you tell her that? You don't fucking remember. You feel like such a fucking idiot you can hardly _believe_ yourself. Your skin flushes hot and your palms grow sweaty and the all-consuming shame of being _so fucking stupid_ threatens to consume you. Why are you here? Why did you come here? What did you expect would happen? 

"Why?"

You don't know what else to say. It's clear her position in the company isn't the only thing that is at play here. You stare at her and the horrible rictus of sadism on her face and you ask _why,_ even though you know you won't get an answer. You're not sure she even has one for herself.

Of course, Meenah dodges the question and slowly stalks towards you, her voice lowered to a dark snarl. "I can make this all go away with just a _word._ You want libel? I can give you libel. I can turn this into just a little bump on the road that'll fade away 'til not a damn fucking soul remembers it." She's standing right in front of you now, so close you can feel her breath on your skin. You're taller than her, but it does nothing in your favor. "I could give you _vindication._ " Her voice lowers to whisper, her lips by your ear, and she says, "I could also fuckin' _ruin you._ "

When you say nothing — when you stare blankly ahead of yourself, your defeat clearly visible in every line of your face — Meenah pulls back out of your personal space and regards you with a lofty disdain she's certainly never needed physical vantage to communicate. "I'll let you think about it," she sweetly informs you, and you don't know what to do other than to leave.

 

***

 

Returning home seems like an impossibility.

You drive for hours, to nowhere in particular. It's almost dawn, and you're exhausted, but you can't sleep. You're restless and unsure of what to do and you need to talk to _someone,_ but you can't face Dirk. You can't face admitting what you've done to anyone close to you. Of course you have to pretend you don't know what's to come — who would even fucking talk to you if they knew what you've done — but what you want is just some shallow fucking affirmation that everything will be okay and that you're not disgusting.

What a joke.

All the same, you can't just fucking drive in circles festering in your own misery. There's only one person you've got who already knew, and although you're sure she has nothing but admonishment in store for you, you'll take even that over the alternative of crushing isolation. You pull into the next large parking lot you see, park in an inconspicuous spot and open up Pesterchum with trembling hands.

turntechGodhead [TG] began pestering tentacleTherapist [TT]

TG: hey are you awake   
TT: Yes.  
TT: I was hoping you'd come talk to me.   
TG: i assume youve already seen the first part of this train wreck   
TT: Mhmm.  
TT: Aren't you wishing you'd listened to me when I told you to break up with him?   
TG: funny thing sis  
TG: i flipped my shit at him and left  
TG: im sitting here in a fucking parking lot talking to you on pesterchum because i cant bear to go back and look at him   
TT: Good.   
TG: no  
TG: not good  
TG: turns out i fucked up again because big fucking surprise  
TG: it wasnt dirk  
TG: i just saw meenah and she told me that she made the leak   
TT: Oh, I see.  
TT: I take it it has to do with her power grab you mentioned a while ago?   
TG: yeah  
TG: she basically told me that if i step down and give her everything shell make it go away  
TG: but if i dont shes gonna have that old fucking bat tell everyone about  
TG: fuck  
TG: i could go to prison  
TG: i could seriously seriously go to fucking prison if this gets out and anyone pursues charges and like  
TG: i dont fucking know what to do  
TG: youre the only person i can fucking talk to about this   
TT: Well, what you should obviously do is break up with Dirk.  
TT: Officially, and for good.  
TT: Not just because your relationship with him is a legal hazard, but also because he is a dick.  
TT: You should also tell Meenah to shove it, and fire her.   
TG: what the fuck would that accomplish  
TG: she would just go through with getting me thrown into fucking jail  
TG: AND i would still lose my boyfriend  
TG: which i may have already because im a hysterical fucking baby   
TT: Give Dirk enough money to move to Who Cares.  
TT: Do you think he wants to go to prison any more than you do?  
TT: If he gets out of dodge before any charges are brought, they would have difficulty proving anything about your relation without somehow convincing Texas to release your birth records.  
TT: Meenah may have enough pull to open a case, but no one is going to care enough to pursue this very far.   
TG: ok so youre a legal expert now  
TG: alright   
TT: If you don't believe me, then just talk to your lawyer. I'm sure she would agree.   
TG: i dont even fucking understand it  
TG: why is this a law   
TT: For a good reason, probably.   
TG: like what   
TT: Power imbalances?   
TG: maybe if i were his fucking daughter or something but im not  
TG: the incest thing isnt even about genetics its who you grew up with  
TG: just because i didnt actually fall out her vagina doesnt mean my mothers not my mother  
TG: and just because we had the same parents doesnt mean dirks my brother in anything but a technicality   
TT: Maybe not necessarily.  
TT: But you do see him that way.   
TG: i just fucking told you i dont   
TT: I don't know if you noticed, Dave, but sometimes you're wrong.  
TT: I've spoken to you more than a couple of times over the course of your relationship, and I have a pretty comprehensive understanding of how your mind works.  
TT: And given your penchant for self-deception, it's likely much better than the one you have.   
TG: i just love how you have turn fucking everything into some screed about how terrible he is  
TG: have you ever considered that maybe i dont want to listen to this presumptuous horse shit right now   
TT: Maybe I am presumptuous and out of line.  
TT: But I also happen to be right, however much you might not want to hear it.  
TT: After all, you "adopted" Mother and me and John and even Eridan. You lost all of your real family, so you learned how to make your own, and you never stopped doing it.  
TT: Be honest with yourself. Why do you _really_ think you're still with him?   
TG: gee i dunno  
TG: maybe because i like him???   
TT: Maybe you do.  
TT: But _why_ do you like him, even after all of the things he's done to you?   
TG: its not his fucking fault that meenah did this   
TT: Forget Meenah.  
TT: Forget the laws, even. Even if none of this were happening, Dirk would still be making you miserable.  
TT: Even if he didn't do it this time, you know this is something he's capable of, and even if you come out of this unscathed, there's always a risk he can use the same information as leverage in the future.  
TT: This has always been hanging over your head.  
TT: It shouldn't even be a fucking question whether or not you should choose letting him go over letting Meenah win.   
TG: i still dont know for sure that he actually did the only big thing he "did to me"  
TG: the rest is just  
TG: petty bullshit in the end   
TT: And you told yourself that lie so often you actually began to believe it!  
TT: Here, I'll tell you why, since you've so thoroughly insulated yourself from reality:  
TT: He does the things he does to you and you forgive him because he's your family.  
TT: And _that_ is everything wrong with your relationship.  
TT: Not the way you were or weren't raised, and not your genetic relation.  
TT: It's because you're the person that you are, and he's the person that he is, and no matter how much you hurt each other you can never let go because _family never ends_.  
TT: Maybe if you were different people you could make it work, but you aren't, and you can't.  
TT: No matter how much you love him, he is fundamentally and irreparably damaged. He cannot help but hurt the people he loves the most, because _that is who he is._  
TT: And you are so desperate for the approval of your family that you are willing to overlook any slight against you as long as he continues to give you the same kind of basic validation you craved from me and our mother.  
TT: And he _knows_ this. He knows that there's nothing he can say or do to you that will make you stop loving him, so he has no reason to even try to change, were he even capable of it.   
TT: Which he isn't, because he's old and stubborn and set in his ways.  
TT: So he'll hurt you and hurt you and hurt you, and you'll _let_ him, because he is your _family._ Because that is the person you are, by nature, reinforced so many times over by your upbringing and your fame.  
TT: If you knew what was good for you you would leave him, but you don't, and you won't.  
TT: And it's so hard to watch because it's so fucking _predictable._   
TG: what  
TG: the fuck  
TG: am i even supposed to say to that   
TT: You don't have to say anything.  
TT: I'm sure that even if you understand everything I've said to you, you won't listen to me. Because you think you need him, and because you're too foolish and prideful to ever admit I'm right.  
TT: I'm sure you'll stay with him until he crosses the line fifty times over and does something _so_ awful not even you will be able to deny it, or until your stubborn co-dependence ultimately ruins any chance you might have had of coming out of this situation without horrible consequences that will mar your life indelibly.  
TT: And I'll be here for you when it happens, Dave, but don't expect me to just sit back quietly and watch as you allow your life to be destroyed for _him._   
TG: you seriously think you know everything dont you   
TT: No, just you.  
TT: But I'm going to sign off now, because all arguing with you will do is help you invent more flimsy justifications for you to tell yourself until you fool yourself into believing that nothing is wrong.  
TT: I don't expect you to take this to heart, but I hope you'll prove me wrong.

tentacleTherapist [TT] ceased pestering turntechGodhead [TG]


	28. Chapter 28

"Dave?"

Jade looks as surprised to see you at the door of her apartment as you are to find yourself there. You immediately begin with a rushed set of excuses. "I didn't know where else to go, I didn't even know if you were still here but I —"

"Dave, it's all right. Just come in."

When she lets you inside, your immediate thought is that _she could afford so much better than this._ It's not run-down, but any means, but it's small — from the look of the central room you followed her into, it's probably just a one bedroom — but you suppose she doesn't need much, being gone from the country probably nine months out of the year.

"Do you want something to drink?" Jade asks you, in the absence of anything else to say. 

"No, I'm... I'm all right."

She shows you to the living area attached to the small kitchen and you sit down with her on the couch. She looks at you closely, eyes sympathetic and worried. "Dave, what happened?"

"You mean, the shit with that old lady?" you start. You're starting to think twice about that drink.

"Anything you want to tell me."

You don't know where to even begin.

"I fucked up," you say. "I fucked up a lot, and often, and badly. I trusted people I shouldn't have and discounted the people who matter to me and I, and I've made decisions that I really can't explain or excuse and this time it's gotten me into a hole I'm never going to fucking dig my way out of. I'm fucking trapped inside my own stupidity and I'm _scared_ and I don't fucking know what to do about it, I —"

"Dave," Jade stops you. She looks at you with clear eyes and you remember who she is.

You tell her the truth. You tell her everything. You don't look at her when you admit it because you can't bear the thought of knowing that you disgust her. You'd rather not see at all. 

She doesn't seem to know what to say when you're finished, but neither do you. The two of you sit in silence for a while. It's strangely comforting. _She's_ comforting. She always has been. You question your choices now, more than ever, but you're not sure you find a conclusion to reach.

"We should go out and get something to eat," you eventually suggest. "Just us. We haven't done that in a long time."

Jade looks unsure. "I don't know if that's the best idea right now..."

"It's okay," you say. You know you look like shit. "No one would recognize me like this."

And no one does. Jade puts her hair up in a ponytail and puts in the contacts she never wears and no one looks at either of you twice. Your eyes sting from fatigue but it's a nice and breezy summer day, and you get a table at a little local place by the beach. You order sandwiches and drinks with shitty little umbrellas and you look to the vast blue of the ocean like you'll never see it again.

Maybe you won't. It still doesn't feel real to you that maybe, you really won't.

You talk about nothing for a while. It helps. You're glad to catch up on all the minutia of her life you've missed. She tells you about how she's been dating a director from New Zealand for a while. You're oddly okay with it.

It eventually becomes unavoidable how utterly disgusting you are — just physically, even. Once the two of you have finished up your meal, you ask, "Hey, do you mind if I use your shower? I'm fucking gross."

Jade laughs softly and takes you home.

You have a shower and spend far longer in it than is probably courteous, but the calming rush of the hot water against your skin clears your head. You spend a long time thinking about everything and nothing. You only get out when the water starts to run cold.

You feel a lot better and a lot more awake by the time you've finished — of course, it only occurs to you after you're done with your shower that your clothes are gross and you don't have any others to wear. You figure that Jade has seen you naked enough times and just steal one of her towels.

When you emerge from the bathroom, your partial nudity does earn you a bit of a startled stare. When you ask, Jade rather sheepishly divulges that she was still holding onto a few of your old things — you had too, so you guessed that'd probably be the case — and you have a change of clothes.

There's not much of an excuse to hang around any longer, but the both of you are obviously reluctant to part. You stand about in the foyer for a while, and eventually awkwardly start, "Well..."

Jade interrupts you with an equivalent lack of grace. "Dave — I just want you to know that... no matter what, you're... I love you, Dave. I always have and I always will. This doesn't change that."

You kiss her.

You have no idea what you're doing. It's abrupt and happens before you've even finished thinking about it. You meant it as a grateful gesture, but when you ought to pull away your lips linger and your bodies draw closer. She's the one who stops you, with a gentle hand against your chest.

"Dave, I —"

You take the moment to look at her in the eyes. They're bright and vulnerable, and it only takes a second's glance to read into every thought in her mind. You don't have to wonder with her. Jade loves you — she honestly and truly loves you — without condition or shame. It feels like a feat to imagine being with someone who knows you _have_ feelings, let alone a considerable amount of regard for them. Why the fuck did you leave her?

To say that you're long past caring about the consequences of your actions is just about as great an understatement as you can imagine.

You lean forward to kiss Jade again and this time she doesn't push you away. She releases a soft sigh against your lips as your arm curls around her waist. The small size of her apartment certainly aids your awkward stumbling to the bedroom.

It feels like it's been an eternity since you'd had sex with a woman. It hasn't been _that_ long, you logically know, but it feels oddly nostalgic all the same. Jade is familiar and pleasing her is an easy memory to recall. It doesn't take either of you long to finish and you have no idea what to think when it's over.

"This was probably stupid," Jade eventually remarks, though she doesn't move from where she lies entangled in your arms. 

"Yeah."

The reality of it all seems to be catching up to her much faster than it is to you. "I — I have a _boyfriend._ "

 _So do you._ But you avoid that subject. All of your exasperation towards Dirk's fears about you and Jade seems a little comedic now. "Are you guys serious?" you ask.

"Well... yes... no... I mean, maybe. We haven't been together very long, but — _gosh,_ I can't believe I just _cheated!_ "

"Does it count if it's us?"

Jade just laughs. "Yeah, it does! Mm. I guess I should probably break up with him now, at least..."

"You don't have to tell him," you say. "This doesn't have to mean anything if you don't want it to."

Jade doesn't seem to know what to say to that. The two of you lay in silence for a while before she speaks again. "I'm flying back out to Australia on Monday. I'm going to be over there for a year, and..." She trails off.

"It was good to see you again," is all you say.

"Yeah," Jade agrees with a sigh. "Have you decided what you're going to do?"

However idiotic this may have been, you can't say you regret it. If you had any doubts about how you felt, they're gone, now.

It takes a moment for you to answer. "I think I have."

 

***

 

You want to sleep, but it feels like there's too little time left to waste it, so you drive back to your apartment. There's no putting it off any further. You have only a short period of time to clean up this mess and it starts with Dirk.

Everything that you'd meticulously planned to say leaves you the moment you pass through the door to your apartment. It's quiet and so are you. You pass through the central area to Dirk's room and let yourself in. You don't bother to knock. 

Dirk looks up at you from where he's sat on his bed. He looks almost surprised to see you. You feel a pang of shame under his judgmental stare. "You're back," he states, plainly. The controlled blankness of his words seems to carry greater intonation than if he'd emoted at all.

"Yeah," you say. "Guess we need to talk."

"Yeah," he echoes. 

He follows you into the living room, because it seems too strange to speak to him in his own space. You feel disarmed. You're not sure the change of locale helps that at all.

"Meenah was the one who made the leak," you say. "She told me."

Dirk at least seems to do you the courtesy of forgetting about your accusatory outburst. "What's her angle?" Dirk asks, crossing his arms over his chest. 

"She said that if I give her the company by noon on Monday that she'll back off." Your mouth feels dry. "If I don't, she's going to have the old lady talk about — us."

"So what are you going to do?" You can tell from his tone that he expects a certain answer, but your head isn't clear enough to be certain what.

You swear your mind has come up with eighty different fucking answers to this same question but this is the first moment when you feel honestly sure.

You love Dirk. You know it isn't worth it. You know he can never really give you what you need. You know that even when he's trying his hardest it'll never be good enough and that in the end he'll destroy you no matter what you do. You know it's fucking stupid, and foolish, and so fucking, fucking dumb, but you love him so much it hurts. Being with Jade made that much clear — no matter how much easier it would be, there's no one you'd rather be with than him. It's a madness that every fiber of your rational being is screaming against but you don't have the fucking strength to resist it.

The revelation at once resigns you and fills you with bitter anger. He doesn't deserve any of it. He doesn't deserve you, and he doesn't deserve what you're going to do for him.

"I'm going to give it up," you mumble.

It's clear the moment the words have left your mouth that it wasn't the decision Dirk wanted to hear. He bristles and sneers and looks at you like he's just so fucking _disappointed._ "Seriously? You're going to let her win?"

The heat begins to rise in your chest. "What other fucking option do I have, Dirk?"

"I'm not going to let some psychopathic broad dictate my life, and neither should you," Dirk stubbornly declares. "Let her do what she wants. We'll find a way to deal with it."

"It's not that simple."

"It'd be a whole lot simpler if you weren't insistent on being a fuckin' coward about it."

"Great, you're back to insulting me," you say, the pitch of your voice rising uncomfortably. It's growing difficult to contain the anxiety buzzing through your head. "So glad I bothered to discuss this with y—"

Dirk groans in exasperation. "Come the fuck on. You have two days to decide. At least check out your legal recourse before you —"

" _Fuck!_ "

It doesn't matter to him how hard it would be for you to live through the public scrutiny of exposure, or a lawsuit, or fucking prison. It doesn't matter that maybe you just want to be able to fucking breathe. He doesn't understand how you don't have a fucking choice because you _can't fucking leave him._

It all comes crashing down on you like a ton of bricks. It's not any one thing. Your mother's death, your shitty relationship, Meenah, your own fucking uselessness and self-hatred and doubt and despair and regret — all you can do is fall to your knees and fucking cry.

Dirk freezes into stiff discomfort as he stares down at you, and for the first time you recognize it for what it is.

He's _scared._

It comes back so vividly that you don't know how you'd forgotten it at all. You're four years old again and you've fallen and scraped your knee; you start to cry, you can't help yourself, you're just a little kid — but he doesn't know what to do, all he wants is for it to stop, so he looks down at you with his jaw set, his lips curled into a disapproving scowl, and his widened eyes safely hidden behind his shades.

"Stop crying," he says, and you realize that for all the years he's still the same scrawny teenage boy with no idea how to live in a world where he's lost everything.

But this time, you don't pick yourself up. You don't dust yourself off, and you don't suck it up, and you don't pretend it doesn't hurt to please him, as if his approval were the only thing that mattered in the world. You aren't that little boy anymore, and you didn't grow up to be the man he wanted you to be.

And you're fucking _glad_.

"No," you sputter. "Fuck you."

He goes rigid where he stands, steeling his expression into artificial blankness. You stare up at him, for once all your fury and frustration and fear laid unashamedly bare, and in return he gives you nothing. He retreats into his stolidity, makes a shield of his pigheaded cowardice, and something in your chest sears. You're so angry you want to scream, so fucking sick of his snide judgments and his ridiculous fidelity to craven dispassion and the way his answer to everything is to just look down his nose at you and make sure you feel ashamed for ever giving a shit about anything. 

The two of you sit like that for a long time, gazes locked as you challenge him with your eyes, but he's been playing this game far too long to change now and you break long before he could even begin to try. He only flinches when you choke out another sob and more tears begin to retrace the worn shimmering trails left on your face.

You defensively pull up your knees as you drag your palms across your reddened eyes and wet cheeks, exhaling shakily. "God, I can't — I can't _do_ this," you breathe. When he says nothing in reply, you simply let the words keep tumbling out, as disjointed as you feel. "You — I — I _can't_ stay with you. You just — _fuck,_ you just make me feel like _shit._ I can't even trust you. You make me feel unsafe, and scared all the fucking time, and disgusting because — because there's obviously something fucking _wrong_ with me that I would even, that I'm so sick and fucking deranged that you'll do everything that you do to me and say the things that you do and be what you are and who you are to me and I _still_ won't — I still just fucking take it, I _know_ this and I put _up_ with it, _Jesus_ you're my fucking _brother,_ everything we've done should make me — I should be — I should _hate_ you, but I don't because _you're my fucking brother!_ "

By the time everything has finished spilling out your chest is heaving and your heart is racing far too quickly inside it, but each breath and every beat is as wasted as any other. He stares back down at you impassively as you break, and all you want is to lay down on the cold tile and just have everything stop forever.

"I _need_ to leave," you say. You even say it with force and conviction because you've never been more sure of anything in your life. But when he still says nothing, when he makes no fucking _effort_ to even — it doesn't even make a difference.

You sniffle and wipe your nose on the back of your sleeve before you allow your hands to fall limp in your lap. You stare down at them, transfixed by the faint sheen of your tears lingering on your palms. You need only shift them slightly for the glinting pattern to change entirely. "But I won't." You look up and meet the empty blackness of his shades. "So here we are."

It feels like an eternity has passed before either of you break the ensuing silence. It would be surprising that it's Dirk if you weren't just so utterly exhausted.

"... You look tired. Let's go to bed, yeah?"

You nod and unsteadily climb to your feet; as you look up, you're surprised to see he'd extended a hand to help you. You hadn't expected him to offer.

When he doesn't withdraw it, you tentatively close your fingers over his anyway. He squeezes them tenderly as you weakly look to him. The gesture is small, and maybe it's all he can even manage.

He leads you to the bedroom by the hand. You go through the motions like an automaton; you strip as he strips, your eyes glassy and unfocused. You return to your routine as if nothing had happened at all; he slips into bed behind you after you do, and when he wraps his arms around your waist, he feels as warm against your back as he ever has. 

When you wake, he's gone.


	29. Epilogue

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Here is the 47,000 word long "epilogue". It's really long so I numbered all of the scenes. You can ctrl+F through them.
> 
> I feel obligated to inform you that this gets bad. This gets bad in a LOT of different ways. If you have *any* issues that you think might upset you, even if you've made it this far OK, I strongly suggest you ask a friend before proceeding. I am extremely serious. I am not playing around in a comedically exaggerated fashion. If you take any fucking warning on this website to heart, let it be this one. FOR THE LOVE OF GOD
> 
> just a blanket warning here tw: everything proceed at your own risk

1.

 

Tick. Tock.

Your gaze wanders up to the clock on the wall of the small office, its rhythmic sound near deafening in the silence. It's a ridiculous thing, like something out of a preschool classroom; the image of an orange tabby is curled around the edge, and its tail hangs below as a kitschy pendulum swaying back and forth. It's hard for you to look at. You get the time and avert your eyes.

It's ten past eleven and you've been sitting here for twenty minutes. You made the point of getting to your appointment early for once, but now you wish you hadn't bothered. You're starting to regret coming at all.

You've just about decided to leave when the the sound of the doorhandle being turned startles you out of your introspection. The face that peeks through is so contrite you almost feel bad yourself.

"Good, you're here! I'm so, so sorry," the girl on the other side of the door says — and it's hard to believe she's anything _but_ a girl, with her high pitched voice and round, childish face. She quickly hurries inside and closes the door behind her, and then takes off her leopard spotted coat to hang on the door. _Holy shit._

Her wardrobe is like some sort of mockery of professional attire — she's wearing a pencil skirt, but it's in a vibrant, obnoxious green with a large and tacky image of a white cat sewn onto the front. Her silk blouse seems inoffensive at first glance, but when you look more closely you discern that the fabric is patterned with a series of little cat heads. Her footwear is more subdued, but you imagine that's only by virtue of getting the cat reference out of the way with the name "kitten heels". On top of the absurd grade-school clothing, she's astoundingly petite, and the tousled chin-length crop of her hair makes her look even more impossibly childlike. You wouldn't put her age over 18 if you had to guess from looks alone, but the PhD certificate hung on the wall of the office suggests otherwise.

"You're... Dr. Leijon?" you ask, the skepticism no doubt permeating your voice — but if she notices, she gives no indication.

"Yes, that's me! Oh, please, but call me Nepeta, okay?" she answers, exceedingly chipper. "There was a real bad traffic jam because of an accident or something so it took me a while to get here, but I promise we'll make up for the lost time!" 

"It's fine. About the traffic," you say. You watch her as she skitters over to her desk to rifle through the papers strewn across it. "I just, uh... expected someone... older."

Dr. Leijon doesn't seem to be affected by your comments. She probably gets this a lot. "I'm 32," she says with a sweet smile, throwing a glancing over her shoulder when she responds.

You remember when you were 32. Maybe it's not so surprising.

"Oh. ... You look very young."

"I know!" she exclaims and turns around, having gathered the stuff she needs.

Nepeta quickly shuffles over to the plush chair sat across from you and takes a seat. "So, Mr. Lalonde, why are you here today?" she asks, smiling broadly. She has a tone to her questions that's mildly patronizing, like she's speaking down to a child, but coming from someone of her stature it's more bizarre than actually bothersome.

"My sister told me I had to come," you immediately answer, like a reflex. It's technically true — you wouldn't have come if she hadn't insisted. "Uh, you can call me Dave."

"Okay, Dave." She jots something down onto her clipboard. It makes you oddly self-conscious. "And what would your sister say is the reason you're here?"

Uhh. Shit. "Fuck if I know. Probably that I'm a huge fuckup who can't do anything right and I need to check myself before I wreck myself or whatever. Seeing you being the method by which I'm supposed to check myself, I guess."

"I see." More writing. You already hate this. "Do you and your sister have a difficult relationship?"

"No, I love my sister," you say, with all the acrid bitterness you can muster.

 

2.

 

TG: i went and saw the stupid therapist   
TT: That's good.  
TT: I'm proud of you, Dave.   
TG: ugh come on   
TT: What?  
TT: I'm serious.  
TT: I know how hard it is for you to talk about what happened.  
TT: This will be good for you.   
TG: whatever   
TT: You did tell her about Dirk, didn't you?   
TG: uh  
TG: not exactly   
TT: ... Dave.   
TG: what   
TT: She can't help you unless you talk to her.   
TG: i DID talk to her  
TG: it was the first fucking session forgive me if i didnt want "hey sup ive got crazy issues because i was fucking my brother please fix me" to be the first thing out of my mouth  
TG: i dont even know if i can trust her yet    
TT: I've met Nepeta. She's very nice, and I have no reason to doubt she's anything but a skilled professional who wants to help her patients.    
TG: dude she looks like a 14 year old girl   
TT: So?   
TG: and she talks to me like im her cat or something  
TG: GOD she has this fucking creepy ass cat thing  
TG: everything in that office is cats  
TG: cats cats cats cats cats she was wearing cats she LOOKED like a cat she basically was this big human cat and it weirded me the fuck out   
TT: You're just looking for excuses to be unhappy with her because you don't want to like her.   
TG: maybe i just dont want to trust somebody who decided they were gonna poke around in peoples brains for a living  
TG: but whatever ill go again  
TG: i guess  
TG: its not fucking like i have anything else to do 

 

3.

 

Your second session begins on an awkward note. "I guess there's something I should probably, uh, tell you... about," you say, wringing your hands.

"What's that?" Nepeta asks. She looks to you with the same unsettling, cutesy smile she always wears.

"You're not allowed to tell anybody about the stuff I say to you, right?"

"That depends," she says with a tilt of the head. "As long as it doesn't concern the abuse of a child or make me think you're seriously planning to hurt yourself, no, I'm not required to report it. And I won't. You can trust me."

"Okay. Uh," you start, fidgeting uncomfortably. "Do you remember that... whole thing a few years back? With that woman who claimed to be my foster parent going on TV and telling everybody I was dating my brother?"

"Yes... I remember that."

"Well. She was kinda not lying? He... really was my brother."

"... Oh," she slowly says.

"Yeah."

There's a moment of uncomfortable silence.

"I thought you won the slander case."

You sigh, pressing your palms into your eyes. "I have good lawyers."

"I see." She writes something down on her clipboard. "It... was an incredibly fast court case..."

"That probably wasn't even the worst of it, believe it or not," you say. "We were — it was fucked up. Shit. I don't even... know where to start. It'd probably be easier to tell you the things that weren't damaged." Your eyes gaze up to the ceiling. It hurts to recall, even now. Even when your mother died and you were fucking wrecked for months, the misery at least changed in form over time, but this —

"But you're not seeing him anymore, right?"

"No, I'm not. And somehow that's the worst part."

You woke up that morning alone.

You didn't know whether to think anything of it, at first. You assumed he'd just gone back to his room. It hadn't been the first time you'd fought, and you had no reason to believe it would be your last. You took a shower, made yourself a shitty breakfast — but as you sat at the kitchen island alone and in the stillness of your apartment a little sinking feeling began to form.

You rose from your seat in the kitchen and made your way apprehensively towards the door to Dirk's room. You pushed it open, slowly, dreading every option of what might lay on the other side, but when you moved to stand in that threshold and look out over the empty expanse of Dirk's room, you knew.

You knew but you didn't want to know. You checked his bathroom, his closet, even under his fucking bed — then your own office, your bedroom and bathroom again, the utility room by the kitchen and the pantry, even every part of the terraces, but you found him as gone as you knew he would be. 

The only thought that went through your mind was that you had made a horrible mistake. However much you may have known on a rational level that Dirk was horrible to you, none of that seemed to compare to the reality of his absence. You could feel your pulse beating in your throat and you felt lightheaded and dizzy and your hands were shaking and all you wanted to do was lay down and wake up from the bad dream, but it wasn't a dream, so you had to get in your car and drive to his old apartment and buzz yourself into his building and knock on his door for half an hour until you finally accepted that he was really gone.

You knew, but you refused to know. You contacted a private investigation firm and gave them every bit of information you could to help find him, but there wasn't a trace. He fucking disappeared off the map entirely. He shut down his business and websites and erased every trace of himself that you even knew to look for — all that remained were a few old shirts he'd left behind.

You got in your car and drove to Texas. You found an old little nursing home in an old little town and in it you found an old little man, feeble in both body and mind. He barely even seemed to register that you were saying words at all. You tried asking the nurses if any of them had seen Dirk, but all of them told you that Mr. Strider hadn't been to visit his uncle in over a year.

The return trip was even longer than the one there. You're not sure you ever really made it back.

"I know I'm better off without him," you say, as if you need to defend yourself. You stare at the ceiling from your reclined position on the couch. "But ever since he left I've felt like... I dunno. Just kinda bad. And it's stupid, because he was a fucking dirtbag."

"It's not stupid to be lonely, Dave," Nepeta assures you. You feel so patronized.

"I'm not _lonely_. I've been _lonely_. This is fucking — this is _derangement_. I can't let go of a man who may as well be fucking dead for all I know, who treated me like trash and fucked up my life more ways than I can even count."

She takes a moment to respond after carefully considering her words. "These things take time, you know? You can't beat yourself up for what you feel. Just... feel it, and it'll get better. Bit by bit."

"I hope so."

 

4.

 

TT: Do you think the therapy helping?   
TG: i dunno  
TG: i sure think the fucking zoloft is helping   
TT: Oh.  
TT: You got a prescription rather quickly.   
TG: yeah  
TG: ive actually been working on a script recently   
TT: Really?  
TT: That's great.  
TT: What are you writing?   
TG: im finishing the sbahj script i started   
TT: Do you have the rights to do more SBaHJ?   
TG: well  
TG: if i do it with my old studio  
TG: yeah   
TT: Dave.   
TG: what    
TT: You can't be serious.   
TG: i need to get back into film eventually rose   
TT: With Meenah?  
TT: After she fucking took everything and stabbed you in the back?   
TG: well whats my fucking alternative  
TG: i dont have the fucking energy to start another studio to work on my fucking movies and no one else will touch me  
TG: im fucking radioactive now   
TT: This isn't a decision you can make lightly.   
TG: im not making it lightly   
TT: I hope that's true.   
TG: so do i

 

5.

 

It's your first summer in California and you were not even close to prepared.

You don't know if this venue doesn't have air conditioning or if it's just the closely packed swell of bodies that's causing the heat, but it's nearly unbearable. You're wearing a fucking suit and it's itchy and too tight in the shoulders and not a part of your body doesn't feel uncomfortably sweaty. You hope the perspiration isn't fucking up your hair.

"I don't know if this was a good idea," you mumble, rolling your shoulders against the pinch of your suit. _Fuck,_ you can't stand this thing.

Jade just swats you on the arm. You look at her and she's practically glowing — her flowing strapless dress has evidently afforded her much more ventilation than you're currently enjoying, and you suppose having lived half her life on an island smack dab on the fucking equator is a leg up over an upbringing spent between New York and Washington. "Dave, we'll find someone eventually. I know it!" she assures you.

If it weren't for her, you'd probably still be holed up in your room playing Neopets, honestly.

"It's just — _it's so fucking hot,_ " you complain. 

"I remember you being really excited to move here," she reminds you. "I thought you hated the cold."

"I do hate the cold. I just — Jesus _Christ_..."

Jade laughs softly and leans up on her toes to kiss you — it's just a peck, but a much more welcome kind of warmth spreads through your chest. It's still new to you. You don't want to let it go.

With a smile and a fond look, your arm slips around her waist and you resolve yourself to not let her down, if nothing else. "Come on, these moneybags aren't gonna give it up easy," you say, and she follows you happily back into the crowd.

You manage to track down a few more producers and studio heads in the throng of partygoers, but these exchanges go much as the last. They're all smiles and good conversation until you let slip what you really want, and from there they maintain the bare minimum of socially required engagement before they can find the most convenient means to excuse themselves.

You're getting kind of demoralized. To be true, you've been out here less than two months and you know that most people who come down to Hollywood don't get their big break for fucking years, if ever, but the reality of how fucking daunting it is hasn't really hit you until just now. You have no idea what you're doing, and no real clue how getting money _happens_. Your apartment is minuscule and expensive and even with your mother doing what she can to help, you don't have nearly enough to realize any of your ambitions. You're afraid you're going to be wasting away out here doing nothing until Jade finally has access to her trust fund.

Jade tells you she has to go to the bathroom, so you let her know you'll be at the buffet and mosey on over to peruse the selection. There's not much you're interested in — you don't know what half of this shit _is_. It's clear you have no fucking business being here. You contemplate a cube of something that might be cheese, but you're interrupted before you can make a decision. 

"Dave," a woman's voice calls out. It's familiar, in a deja-vu sort of way — it's just off enough that you can't place it by the sound of it.

When you turn around to look at her, you don't make the connection immediately either. Your eyes scan down her body — long, thick black hair, tan skin, a stark and prim business suit that probably cost eight of what you're wearing — and you don't realize it until you catch a glimpse of a single rubellite-studded band around her left wrist.

Your mouth opens and closes before you manage to choke out, "I — _Meenah?_ "

This woman is utterly unrecognizable. Gone are her thin braids and infinite array of piercings, and she's gained easily twenty pounds. Her brows are meticulously groomed and her face is painted in decidedly feminine makeup that includes not a dab of obnoxious magenta. What the fuck? Your confusion only compounds when she opens her mouth.

"Long time no see, Dave," she purrs. You cannot believe your ears.

Meenah Peixes is the bluntest and crassest human being you've ever encountered in her life. She is mean, vicious and to the point. She does not speak words so much as venom. Her entire countenance is rough, brash and utterly devoid of a smooth edge and here she is now, straight fucking out of my _My Fair Lady._

"What the fuck _happened_ to you?" is all you can think of to say in the face of that.

She gives you a little half-smile and you feel something in your chest seize. You don't know what it is — fury, joy, grief, regret, relief — but you know you don't want it, not from looking at her.

"Life," Meenah answers, but the edge to her voice isn't a kind of bitterness you've ever known from her.

Before you have a chance to say anything to that, she swiftly changes the subject. "I saw you here with Jade," she says. "I presume you're together now."

"I — yeah," you reply. You feel almost guilty admitting it, as if — as if you're _cheating_ , but you haven't seen Meenah in nearly two years and she would never do monogamy anyway so why do you even — 

"That's nice."

"Yeah — it — it is." You feel so fucking stupid. Why are you such an idiot?

You look at her and she looks at you and you don't know what to say next. All you want to do is scream at her, honestly. It's a fucking struggle not to tear off this stupid fucking jacket and just — you don't even know. You want to kill her and kiss her in equal parts.

Instead, you begin an awkward question. "What happened to the —"

She cuts you off. She knew exactly what you were going to ask, and saves you the trouble of saying it. "She turned a year old this last March," she says.

"You kept her?" you ask. You're actually really surprised to hear that.

"Her name is Feferi."

 _Feferi._ There's so much more you want to know but you look over Meenah's shoulder and see Jade heading back in your direction and — fuck, you'd forgotten all about Jade. You're petrified. Is that why Meenah is here? Is she going to tell Jade about your — her — you don't know if it's yours — about _whose-ever_ fucking baby it is and ruin everything you've worked so fucking hard to build since she destroyed your fucking life?

"I — please don't tell her," you hurriedly mumble in a low voice as Jade draws near and pray she doesn't catch it.

"Hey Dave, I'm back! Who is —" Jade comes to a stop beside you and looks to Meenah with the most dumbstruck expression you've ever seen on her face. " _Oh my god._ "

"Good to see you again, Jade," Meenah says, and you don't even hear an ounce of biting sarcasm in her voice.

Jade looks to you, eyes wide and her jaw hanging open. You have no explanation to give to her.

You're certainly not expecting what she does next; Jade quickly snaps around and trains Meenah with a look of _pure fucking hate_. She is practically shaking with anger, her hand tightly squeezing the circulation off from yours. "How fucking _dare_ you come here after what you did to him? What gives you the _right_ to —"

"Jade," you hiss. "Jade, calm down, people are going to sta—"

"No need to get _pissy_ ," Meenah says. The word sounds so strange spoken through her affectation of propriety. "I've only come here to make you a proposal." 

Proposal of _what?_ You look at her skeptically, and Jade appears to hold your concerns tenfold. "What could _you_ possibly have to offer us?" Jade answers for you, all knives.

"Five million dollars," Meenah smoothly replies, not missing a beat.

Now you're the one with your mouth hanging open. 

"You're looking for funding to produce a film, aren't you?" she asks, with a small smirk and a tilt of the head. "That's what I'm offering you."

"I — how could you possibly have five million dollars to give to me?"

You can't say you know much about Meenah's family, for all the time you spent with her. You knew her parents were from Hawaii, and that she despised them, and that they were paying top dollar to send her to an out of state school in Seattle — but when you tracked her down two years prior in Los Angeles — let's just say you weren't under the impression that she was getting anything from them anymore.

Before Meenah has a chance to answer your question, Jade cuts in again. "We're not interested in whatever dirty tricks you've got up your sleeve. Leave us _alone_ , Meenah."

Meenah looks to Jade with a peculiar expression. "There are no tricks. I'm making a gesture of faith. You can take this money and use it on whatever you want — I don't care. I obviously expect to be repaid, but this is an _investment_ , not a loan. If there's no money to return, well, that's on me, isn't it?"

"I don't trust you at all," Jade scathingly dismisses her.

For all that's changed about her, Meenah's ability to strip you bare with just a look hasn't diminished even a bit; when she speaks again, her eyes are locked onto yours. 

"What do you possibly have to lose?" 

 

6.

 

"It was really good," Jade gushes. "I missed seeing your movies. Really!"

This is the first time you've been out in years and not felt like a criminal and a fraud. It's been ages since you've been back to this restaurant — it's exactly the kind of disgustingly expensive indulgence you needed and didn't feel like you deserved. You still don't, really — Dirk probably saw to it that you never will again — but having a movie out has at least given you the idea that a little bit of celebration isn't so bad. You allow yourself a tentative smile. 

"I'm glad. Man, it's been so long, I was a little worried I didn't have it in me anymore."

The dim lights of the restaurant illuminate Jade's smiling face. She still looks as young as she ever has; for all the time you've known her, hardship has done a wonderful job of passing her by. "Well, you've got nothing to fear!" she confidently reassures you. "I think it was your best yet."

"Did you know I hired Samuel L Jackson as a _grip?_ "

"Whaaaaaat?? Oh my god, that's... that's... I don't even know what that is."

"Fucking amazing, right?"

The both of you laugh. It feels good. It's just... weird to feel good. It's not perfect, but it's a start.

The drugs have helped you focus. They've helped you... not care, even, but it's difficult to articulate the difference between the apathy you felt while depressed and the relative ease you're able to process things with now. It just comes a day at a time.

"It's been so long since we've been able to do this," Jade says, a grin spread across her face you'd almost say is shy.

"Yeah," you say. You pick at your food. Your appetite still isn't as robust as it was, for all your progress. "We don't get enough time."

It's a conversation you've had many times before, laments for better days that have become more of a tradition of whatever short little meetings you get to have with Jade than an actual longing to see each other. Not that you don't miss Jade, but you've accepted that your lives were going to be lead more apart than not.

But it seems that tonight is different.

"Yeah... about that."

"Huh?" you ask, looking up. Jade is definitely looking bashful now.

"My contract with Discovery is coming up early next year and I was thinking I'd... maybe I wouldn't renew?" she says, the upwards inflection of her question very awkwardly tacked on. "I dunno, maybe." Now she's the one picking at her food.

You're actually surprised. You remember the first few years after she'd got her gig — even before she was big it still ended up a pretty big factor in impeding the amount of time you got to spend with each other. You even tried to convince her to bail out, a couple of times, after you were making enough money that you could've easily sustained both of you on your income alone. But she never would — she had a passion for it, she said, and the things she got to do and the places she got to go were so exciting and wonderful that she didn't think she could ever give it up, not for anyone. Not even you.

"Really? I thought you loved the work."

"I do!" she's quick to reply. "But I... it doesn't have the novelty it once had, you know? I've got to do a lot of things. Good things! I've helped people and animals and I've gotten to see things I'd never thought I would in a million years and now I'm — it's like I'm satisfied. I've done my part and done my adventuring and now... there are other parts of life, I think. That I might have been missing out on life, doing what I was doing. I could stop now. I think I'd be happy."

"Well, if that's — if that's what you want to do, then you should do it."

Then she gets to the real point. "And I... I'm still single. And you are too, now. So..."

You lay your fork down. That shit's a lost cause. "You want to get back together?" you ask, tone even.

"Well, if you want to," she hurriedly answers.

"Why not?" you shrug. Jade's rather perturbed expression seems to indicate that that was not the level of enthusiasm she was anticipating from you. You try to save face. "I've missed you."

That seems to perk her up. A goofy grin finds its way back onto her face. "I've really missed you too," she gushes. "I don't think there's anyone in the world I could love. I almost feel silly having let you go as long as I did!"

"That shit's all in the past. You've got me now, and that's all that matters."

 

7.

 

"I got back together with my ex-girlfriend," you say.

"Oh? Jade, you mean?"

"Yeah."

"You don't sound that thrilled about it," Nepeta notices. Stunning deduction on her part.

You sigh. "It's just — I don't know. I was with Jade for a really long time. I loved her. I still love her. But, it — you know — it ended and I moved on. I said yes cuz I didn't want to say no, but... god."

"Hm?"

"I thought about it. Getting back together with her when I was with — with Dirk," you mumble. It's hard to say his name out loud. "I slept with her once, towards the end. When it was really bad. And I knew then — just — whatever I have with her, it's not what I want. But I can't have what I want from anyone who isn't — it's stupid."

Nepeta looks to you with a softly furrowed brow. "You definitely shouldn't stay with her just because you feel obligated to, Dave. If she isn't making you happy, you should follow your instincts, you know?"

"But this is the happiest I've _been_ since my mother died, and I know no one will ever match up to what he was to me, so shouldn't I just fucking settle? The alternative is that I'm alone forever, and I — I just want to be done with it, right?"

"Have you considered trying to be with another man? It might —"

"I'm not gay," you hastily reply. At the subtly skeptical shift in her expression, you have to hurriedly clarify yourself. "I mean, I'm not saying that I'm not — like, I'm bisexual, yeah. But it's not because Dirk was a guy. I don't think so."

You're not sure she's convinced; you feel self-conscious as she adds to her notes. When she finishes, she looks up to you with a hesitant expression. "Hmm. I hope you don't find the suggestion offensive, but with your family history, it mi—"

"Yeah, I know I picked up an incest fetish," you sigh.

"Oh," Nepeta says. She seems surprised that you admitted it so quickly. "When you say a _fetish,_ do you mean it in the formal sense?"

"What? Oh, no, I guess. I mean, I can get it up without having to pretend Jade is my sister, god — and I'm not into roleplaying or whatever. Or any of my other siblings, for that matter. Fucking John or Rose would be — just, no. It was... only him. That he was my brother. My real one. And I'm making it sound like the fucking incest thing was the _only_ thing and it's really not but — like, there was just... a lot. Of stuff. Of... really fucked up shit, that I either can only get from him, or really, really shouldn't want from anyone else."

 

8.

 

TG: well  
TG: its official  
TG: jades discvery contract came up today  
TG: shes done   
TT: That's great.   
TG: yeah  
TG: shes moved back in  
TG: so were just like  
TG: back to the way things wre i guess  
TG: its fucking bizarre   
TT: How so?   
TG: i dunno  
TG: is just li ke i wake up and  
TG: wonder if any of that shit even happened  
TG: like it was some fuckeed up dream and i feel like  
TG: is like when your just in the middle of one when you wake up and you just want to go back  
TG: to know how it ends  
TG: and   
TT: Dave, are you drunk?   
TG: haha yeah  
TG: a little   
TT: Are you alone?   
TG: what am i not allowed to have a few ddrinks   
TT: Sure you are.  
TT: I'm just a bit concerned that you are alone, and pestering me drunk at 1 in the afternoon.   
TG: hwey  
TG: hey rose   
TT: What?   
TG: fuck off  
TG: hahahahhahaha

 

9.

 

"Dave, I'm, uh — pregnant."

"Oh," you say. You're not sure what else to say. Jade gives a small shrug with the positive test in her hand. You feel very self-conscious staring at her in her underwear, but you don't get the feeling that you can exactly just turn back to your computer and leave it at that. You share an awkward moment of silence before you speak up again. "I'll go with you to take care of it tomorrow."

"Um... okay."

Jade looks like she wants to say something else, and you're torn between wanting to know what's wrong and wanting to hide away forever from whatever you fear those words would be. It's not the first time Jade has had an abortion, and this time is definitely different from the last. You find refuge in a bit of private denial.

Just after you've turned to return to your work, Jade seems to have found the courage on her own and starts again.

"I thought that maybe, this time — instead of — well, it's just that I'm getting older and so are you, and we're secure now, we don't travel so much, we —" She interrupts her own babbling to collect herself, drawing in a deep breath. "I think I want to keep it? If that's... if that's what you want. I think it's what I want."

_Oh god._

You look at her like she has eight heads, and then immediately feel like a fucking dick because you can't just _react_ that way and _Jesus Christ_ she's staring back at you like a kicked puppy.

"We — you don't have to make the decision right now," you say, hoping your attempts to keep the slowly mounting panic from your voice are successful. "Maybe give it a week. Or two, or three, or —"

"I'm pretty sure I've made up my mind," she cuts you off, sounding disconcertingly confident. "I sort of... well, I'd decided I wanted to ask you if we could try to... to have — it was months ago, even, but I could never get the nerve up and then this just happened and I —"

"God. Did a condom break? I know you went off the pill but I thought I was careful —"

"Dave, it's okay, it's not your fau—"

"I'd be a shitty dad —"

"Oh, Dave, no you wouldn't, you're —"

"— I just don't know if I'm ready to —"

"If not now, when?"

You've reached your limit. It's become acutely clear to you that this is not something you're going to argue your way out of, but you feel like you have no choice but to stall anyway. " _I don't know!_ " you say, more forcefully than you'd have liked. "I don't know — I need to think about this, all right? Like, it's my decision too, right?"

"Of course it is," she says, though you can tell from every line on her face that she's not going to be happy if you say no.

 

10.

 

"My girlfriend's pregnant," you say. Your fingers dig into the upholstery of the chair you're sat in painfully. "She wants to keep it."

"Oh?" Nepeta cheerfully replies — she seems to find her professional concern halfway through and reigns back in her demeanor for her follow-up question. "How do you feel about it?"

"i don't know," you answer. "I don't think I'm ready to be a father. Holy shit."

"Parenthood is a big responsibility!"

"No shit!" You're almost starting to regret coming in today. You wish you could just not think about it a little longer, but the point of no return is drawing closer and closer. "But I just — I get the feeling that no matter what I do — she said that it was my choice too, but — I think the only choice I have is whether or not I'm going to stick around when she has it."

Nepeta looks at you carefully. "Have you brought this up to her?"

"No, but —"

She cuts you off, chipper, "Communication is always the best policy! Working yourself up based on an imagined exchange is only going to cause problems. You can't be sure that's true until you talk to her about it, right?"

"I... guess."

 

11.

 

TG: you ever thought about having kids  
TG: like with vriska   
EB: whoa.  
EB: where's this coming from?   
TG: nowhere  
TG: i mean  
TG: youre about to turn what 30 now   
EB: 29...   
TG: ok shut up i was close   
EB: there's a BIG difference between 29 and 30.   
TG: no there really isnt you shit child  
TG: anyway i mean  
TG: its like around that time for us isnt it  
TG: i guess me more than you but   
EB: dave, is your biological clock ticking?   
TG: no this is terrible  
TG: cant i just ask you an obtuse fucking question about your life without having to actually explain why im asking it   
EB: no.   
TG: you are actually worse than rose  
TG: ok jade is pregnant   
EB: !!  
EB: holy shit, really?   
TG: yeah  
TG: its not like its the first time but  
TG: she wants to keep it  
TG: and i  
TG: really dont think i want to   
EB: wow.  
EB: that's kinda heavy, dude.   
TG: you are not even a little bit helpful why am i even talking to you    
EB: sorry... i don't really have any experience with this, i guess.  
EB: honestly, i can't really see it ever happening for me and vriska?  
EB: i mean, i'd like to have kids some day, maybe. but she...  
EB: i dunno.  
EB: besides the fact that we're both waaaaaaaay too busy to even think about it right now, i don't think she would. i wouldn't even feel comfortable talking to her about it.  
EB: we don't really discuss the future much.   
TG: and you married her why   
EB: ok, let's not even begin to pretend that you have any room to criticize me for my romantic life choices anymore, mr. brotherfucker.   
TG: oh were gonna go there huh  
TG: all right why dont i just tell rose about how you had a picture of her in your locker in middle school   
EB: oh my god.   
TG: yeah i fuckin saw that you punk   
EB: that wasn't...  
EB: god, how do you even remember that?  
EB: one, that doesn't mean anything, two, rose is my stepsister???  
EB: not the same thing!!  
EB: also i was thirteen!!!   
TG: uh huh sure  
TG: you totally arent choking your chicken to my sister to this day   
EB: what!  
EB: i do not masturbate to rose, dave.   
TG: i dunno man have you seen rose shes pretty cute  
TG: i cant say i blame you   
EB: no shes not!!!   
TG: wow  
TG: wow  
TG: are you calling rose ugly   
EB: no! that wasn't what i meant at all!  
EB: i just mean that i don't think she's cute. because she's my sister??? also because i'm married and she's a lesbian!   
TG: wow bet shes gonna be shocked to learn you think lesbians cant be cute too   
EB: oh my god, i hate you so much.   
TG: dude you are the chumpiest chump ive ever met i couldnt find a dude easier to troll in a nursery   
EB: i might actually kill you. i'll let you know when i've thought about it for a bit.   
TG: ok well i have no idea what this conversation was even about but i feel a little better now i guess  
TG: thanks dude   
EB: you're welcome.   
TG: may as well go talk to jade now   
EB: probably a good idea.  
EB: later.  
EB: ... please don't tell rose about the locker thing.   
TG: ill be sure to take your concerns into consideration bro  
TG: peace

 

12.

 

"I guess... well, you're pretty much right," Jade sheepishly says. 

Well, there goes your worst fears being confirmed. You have to sit down by the kitchen island and it's difficult to come up with a response. What you settle on is disjointed and childish. "This — this isn't fair — I —"

You stop when you see the hurt in her eyes. God, bringing this up was a mistake. "It's _my_ body, Dave," she stubbornly proclaims.

You knew she was going to bring it there. The last thing you want is to get embroiled in some fucking misdirected women's rights argument. "Yeah, it is — but that's not —" You struggle to find the correct words every time her face twitches in response to your protests. "If you won't get rid of it or give it up then I either — then I either have to stay or I'm a fucking monster, this isn't a real choice —"

"It _is_ a choice. It's totally up to you to decide what you want to do. I won't force you to stay if you don't want to," she says, chin held high.

"I'm not some normal fucking dude who can just walk out and hand you child support every month," you plead with her. "The media will fucking crucify me."

All your arguing appears to be doing is making her more convinced. "Maybe they ought to!"

"You're not giving me any say in this at all!"

" _I am,_ " she replies, clearly angry now. This is going about as poorly as you could have imagined. "But if you keep treating me like this, you can bet I'll make the decision _for_ you!"

So that's it. You're trapped. You have to have a fucking kid. You thought going on drugs had stopped your panic attacks but your heart is beating too quickly and your breath feels a little tight and _did you even take your pills this morning?_ You can't remember. You're trying to and you can't. 

"Jade, I'm fucking terrified," you eventually tell her. You don't know what else to say.

Her face softens at that. "Me too," she admits.

"Then why —"

"We'll never not be scared, you know? You're never ready to have a kid. Not really," she says. "But we'll do all right. I know we will."

You really, really hope she's right. 

 

13.

 

TG: hey princess   
CC: ??? Who is this?   
TG: what you cant guess   
CC: Ummmm.  
CC: Katie?   
TG: not even sort of close   
CC: 38/  
CC: Sam?   
TG: come on fefs   
CC: Oh my god.  
CC: Oh my god!  
CC: Dave??   
TG: bingo  
TG: hows it going   
CC: Oh woowww. It's been so long!  
CC: How did you find my pesterchum?   
TG: it was on your tumblr   
CC: How.... did you find my tumblr.......    
TG: i found one of your facebook friends blogs and followed the selfies   
CC: Oh jeez. I didn't know it would be so easy to find.   
TG: it was actually sort of hard this is kind of creepy   
CC: A little.  
CC: I guess I need to do some housecleaning. My mom can NOT know about my blog.   
TG: hate to break it to you but your mom is sort of an evil mastermind  
TG: 110% chance she has it set as her home page on IE or whatever shitty browser fascists use   
CC: Oh no...   
TG: yeah be careful what you post on the webbertubes kiddo   
CC: Oh my god, you are SO OLD.   
TG: yeah thats me  
TG: your fuckin grandpa dave  
TG: anyway speaking of your mom being shitty  
TG: obviously dont tell her i talked to you  
TG: delete this log after were done tbh   
CC: Did my mom forbid you from speaking to me or something?   
TG: what did you actually think i didnt talk to you for two years on purpose   
CC: Umm... I didn't really know.   
TG: shit fef im sorry  
TG: yeah we had a falling out i guess   
CC: I thought you were already fallen out.   
TG: like a double falling out   
CC: Didn't you just make a movie with her??   
TG: yes  
TG: but  
TG: ok its complicated i cant tell you all the details   
CC: Okay...   
TG: anyway i wanted to see you  
TG: in secret  
TG: cause youre a cool ass kid even if your mom is the hugest bitch on gods green earth   
CC: Dave, I'm FIFTEEN.  
CC: Totally not a kid anymore?   
TG: oh god youre an actual teen now  
TG: jesus christ i am old   
CC: Yeah. How old are you now, 80? 85?   
TG: 35   
CC: Golly. Finding gray hairs yet?   
TG: im blond fef   
CC: You know, I'd always sort of assumed you dyed your hair...   
TG: nah  
TG: i guess most people think that cause my eyebrows are dark and i wear mascara but i dont  
TG: just happens that way sometimes  
TG: drapes dont match the carpet but its real   
CC: OMG. GROSS.   
TG: thought you werent a kid anymore  
TG: its easy to talk tough isnt it   
CC: Ugggghhhhh.   
CC: Changing the subject!!  
CC: So, where are you gonna take me?  
CC: You missed my birthday, twice. You're gonna have to pay up for that one BIG TIME.   
TG: yeah dont i know it  
TG: idk wanna go to disneyland   
CC: Dave... fifteen!   
TG: theres no such thing as too old for disneyland   
CC: Um, there kinda is.  
CC: Ugh. Why don't you just come over to my place and hang out?  
CC: We can watch a movie or something.   
TG: yeah thatd complicate the whole "i hate your mom" thing   
CC: Relax. She's in Hawaii for the next week and a half.   
TG: what she didnt bring you with her   
CC: Blegh, no. I didn't want to go. I've been to Hawaii SO many times, it's boring.  
CC: There are beaches RIGHT HERE.   
TG: and youre just at home unsupervised??   
CC: Fif-fucking-teen Dave!!!!!!!   
TG: watch your language young lady   
CC: Oh my god, completely going to kill you!  
CC: Why don't you just come over tomorrow at six and I'll make you dinner. I am an AMAZING cook, you know.   
TG: i dunno  
TG: if im there by 6 and we eat and watch a movie wont that be cutting it really close to your bedtime   
CC: GOD!!!!!!!!! I'M SCREAMING IRL!!!!!!!!   
TG: just too easy

 

14.

 

You buzz yourself into Meenah's apartment complex without issue. The security guy on the front desk even waves and greets you by name. You'll have to remember to tell him not to mention you were here to Meenah.

The elevator takes an unusually long time to carry you to the penthouse floor. You check your phone for the time. It's 6:30. Welp. You've never been particularly punctual, anyway.

You take your time making it to Feferi's front door, but when you knock, the girl on the other side is startlingly quick to wrench it open.

"You're late!" Feferi announces the moment she sees your face, a look of comical annoyance plastered across hers. 

_Jesus fucking Christ_ — what a difference two years make. You would not have recognized this girl on the street if you'd seen her. Her hair's been bleached yellow-blonde with a liberal accent of bright magenta dye along the left side of her face, but for all of her ostentation preparation, she appears to have taken care to let her roots show. Her face is caked with makeup in such a way that it makes her skin look spray tanned, even despite the fact you know that is actually what her natural skin tone is. From the looks of it, her entire outfit is home made; dozens of gaudy plastic necklaces hang from her neck, and you have no fucking idea what is going on with that skirt. It's bright blue and green with a pink trim, alarmingly short in the front but cut with a bizarre set of trailing tails in the back. 

All of it immediately reminds you of Meenah. Granted, Meenah's teenage phase was... pretty much the exact diametric opposite of whatever the fuck _this_ is, but looking at her makes you feel oddly nostalgic.

Still: _Jesus dick, Feferi._

Feferi seems to have read your surprised expression in a very different way. She immediately puts on a coy smirk and juts out her hip to the side. "Not so little anymore, huh?"

Yes. You observe that Feferi does now, in fact, stand in possession of some T and A. A rather impressive amount of it. You try not to dwell on it.

When Feferi turns to lead you into the apartment, your eyes remain decidedly raised. You follow her inside; at the end of the short hallway to the central living area, she claps her hands and the room comes to life.

If you ever entertained the thought that your own apartment was excessive, Meenah's puts yours to shame. You don't even know where to begin in estimating the height of the vaulted ceilings of the penthouse, which looks over the city with its enormous eastward-facing glass windows. The decor is aggressively modern, meticulously coordinated and ostentatiously expressive of wealth. Even the most fleeting glance around makes it obvious that there is not a single technological amenity that the Peixes family lacks; the home theatre amidst the living room's multi-thousand dollar furniture arrangement is particularly extravagant.

What's new, you've noticed, is that Meenah appears to have acquiesced to allow Feferi to participate in some of the decorating. The walls are covered in framed art now, and, well — let's just say that it's fairly obvious that Feferi is her daughter. They just have a very, very large fridge.

"Okay, I've already started cooking some things — oh, did I tell you? I don't remember if I told you. I'm a vegan now," Feferi announces as she turns to face you, matter-of-fact. You had noticed the smell of food. "Sorry, no animal products for you tonight!!"

 _Yeah, bet that'll last._ You know how that girl gets around sushi. You're not gonna give her a hard time, though — you don't give a fuck what she makes for you, you'll eat it and pretend to love it no matter how shitty it is. "Sounds good."

Feferi waves you over to follow her into the kitchen and you do so with mild trepidation. What you find is certainly not what you expected, or what you feared — set up on the dining table is a practically an entire fucking banquet of food, and you can see more to come cooking on the stove.

"Jesus Christ," you gape. "Feferi, I can't eat all this."

Feferi looks to you with a maniacal grin. "That's okay!! That's TOTALLY fine. You can just start with something and if you don't like it, you can try something else. I'm sure there'll be something you think is good! Anything that's left over I can just put in the fridge and eat later, no big deal, right?"

"... Sweetheart, you don't have to try so hard," you reluctantly inform her. You don't want to harsh her buzz, but you're not sure you're going to be able to handle overtures for your affection any more desperate than this. It probably needs to stop here.

You can see her face turn bright red, even beneath the pounds of makeup. "I'm not — I just —"

"Relax. I already think you're great. There's no need to impress me 'cause I'm already impressed, yeah?"

You're not sure she's convinced.

All the same, you're pleasantly surprised to discover that the food's not that bad. Pretty good, even. You like most of everything you try — and she _does_ make you try everything after all. It feels like it's never going to end.

"You been doing well in school?" you smalltalk towards the end of the barrage of dishes.

"Straight As as always," Feferi proudly proclaims. You weren't exactly expecting a teenager to honestly reply to this question, but she immediately begins to ramble on. "I've started thinking about college lately too. I mean, it's only a few years away, right? Mom wants me to stay local but, UGH, I kind of want to get away, you know? PLUS, I've started to think about maybe going to art school instead and Mom is SO not behind me on that."

Well, that's new. "I thought you wanted to be a marine biologist?" you ask.

"I DID, but I don't know! Maybe art is my real calling?? Like, that'd be really cool, but like, everyone tells me my art is amazing? Maybe if I got really good at it I could be famous! I already have like twenty thousand followers on tumblr, you know. I guess I'm sort of a big deal..."

"I'm sure you can do whatever you put your mind to, kiddo," you gently assure her.

"Well, that's the thing," Feferi shyly begins. She's giving you some sort of _look_ now. You think she's trying the puppy face. "Mom said she doesn't want me to go to art school, and... she makes way too much money for me to get any sort of financial aid, so there's NO WAY I'd be able to pay for it myself. I just know she'll refuse to help me... sigh."

She actually says 'sigh' out loud. You blink slowly.

You don't know why she's even bothering to play it coy. "Yes, Feferi, I'll put you through art school," you say, eyebrow raised. "You could have just asked."

"Oh my goodness!!" she shrieks, elated. You're a little startled by the shrill noise. "Thank you SO SO SO SO SO MUCH!!! This means the world to me, Dave!!"

As if the squealing weren't enough, Feferi elects to bound out of her seat to rush over and hug you. It is a bit alarming, but you awkwardly pat her on the back when you get your bearings. "It's, uh, no problem," you tell her.

"All right!!" Feferi proclaims and jumps back to her feet. "I'm gonna pack all of this stuff up and then we can watch something, okay?"

You're more than a little relieved to be given a reprieve and gladly rise to help her put away the leftovers. You are immediately certain that you have, in fact, eaten way too fucking much. Ugh. "What do you want to watch?" you ask her, when everything is cleaned up.

"Weelll... do you..." Feferi pauses, looking bashful. "Dave, do you... like anime?"

That is not what you were expecting her to ask. "Uh. That depends. I guess, a few —"

"GREAT!" she shouts, and brings her hands together with a loud clap. "Okay, well, there's this AMAZING new anime called _Free!_ but I call it _The Swimming Anime_ — anyway, it's about these boys, right? They were like, friends in elementary school or whatever, they were all in a swim club and their names are Haruka, Makoto, Nagisa and Rin, and those are all girls' names in Japanese if you didn't know. But in the swimming anime now they're in high school and like, Rin is all like, the really successful one, right? He went to a special school in Australia and stuff and wins _awards_ and — but he's like, a huge dick to Haruka when he comes back!!! Oh em gee, and there's, like, so much _ho yay_ — Oops, do you even read TV Tropes? Probably not, hahaha! But you like boys, right, I mean — you dated a guy, right?? Um, sorry if that's a sore subject, anyway, all the boys are sooooooo hot, they're all muscular and stuff which is crazy for anime, this is such a good anime and..."

Your eyes glaze over as she rambles on. You don't want to watch this anime.

"Um, maybe another ti—"

"Ohhhh, Dave, please! Give it a chance! Pleeeaaaasseee!!!"

It's almost eight at night on a Saturday and you are 35 years old and you are watching anime with a teenage girl.

You haven't exactly kept especially abreast of the latest trends in Japan, so to say you're a little shocked by these bulbously muscled children flapping through weird pseudo-CGI water is a bit of an understatement. 

The first thing you notice is that none of these boys have any nipples. "Where the fuck are their nipples?" you ask. Feferi looks at you like you're nuts.

"This is an anime. They can't show the nipples."

"I've seen man nipples in anime before," you object.

"This isn't THAT kind of anime!!!"

Throughout the ordeal you feel vaguely uncomfortable. You're not sure what it is, because you've watched actual gay porn less awkward to witness than this. Maybe it's the shameless panning of the camera or the weird liney muscles that never look completely right. You just keep coming back to the fact that _none of them have any fucking nipples._

Feferi, however, is utterly enraptured. You're sure this is at the minimum her fifth viewing of this mess, but she's as enthusiastic as if it were the first time. She keeps rattling off trivia about the voice actors that you couldn't possibly care less about and announcing about four times an episode that "Oh my god, I LOVE this part!!"

You check the clock on the wall. It's past nine and you're only three episodes in. Feferi notices your furtive glances and seems to take it as an opportunity to hopefully inquire, "What do you think so far??"

"Well, umm, It's kind of —" You think better of saying what you were going to say as you watch Feferi's expression fall in tune with your lack of projected enthusiasm. You choke mid-sentence and try a different tactic. "I guess I haven't seen enough of it to say for sure, but I'm getting a little tired, so —"

"Tired?? It's only 9:05!" 

Shit. "I, uhh — I've been going to bed early lately. I'm old, you know?"

"Oh, come on!! There are only 12 episodes!!"

9 more episodes, at nearly 25 minutes an episode... that's... vastly longer than you want to spend on this thing, at any point of your life, let alone into the earliest hours of the morning. "Maybe another time," you try to gently tell her.

Thankfully, she seems to accept that — but before you can get up to go, she begins to grill you zealously. "Okay, but tell me, who is your favorite so far?"

"My favorite?" Jesus, you can't just pick none of them, can you? "Well, I —"

"Personally I think Nagisa is best boy but Ri—"

You cut off Feferi immediately. "Whoa, fucking Nagisa? Are you serious? Nagisa is easily the worst," you forcefully declare.

"Wh— !! No, that's totally wrong!!" Feferi whines in a huff. "Nagisa is super cute!! He's my husbando."

"Wh... your... your what?"

"My husbando," Feferi clearly repeats, as if you're stupid. "Ugh, you wouldn't understand. You're too OLD."

You reel from the absurdity of the statement. "Old enough to know that Nagisa is fucking annoying as hell. He's like a particularly aggravating middle school girl who thinks he's cute but isn't actually at all. I mean, they _all_ act like weird middle school girls, but him especially. He's bad. I want to punch him whenever he opens his stupid mouth. He's the most punchable anime character of all time easily. I would not anime marry him."

Feferi just responds to you with an indignant huff and turn of her nose, and before you can argue, she turns on the next episode. _Lord_. "Maybe you'll change your mind when you've seen more!"

You don't know why you're going along with this. It's another three episodes before anything even vaguely approaching tension or conflict appears, and even that is contrived, and swiftly supplanted by the return of the teenaged hissyfits.

You've concluded pretty soundly that Nagisa and Rin are shit tier garbage human beings, Rin perhaps more so than Nagisa, and that Haruka is a petulant child at best. Makoto has such a mild and inoffensive presence that you struggle to have any sort of feeling about him at all, negative or positive. Rei... you don't know if it could be said that you _like_ him, but you are slowly developing some sort of emotion resembling pity towards him. He's just sort of sad.

That impression steadily mounts as hour after hour passes and you finally approach the last of the episodes. Rin is such an utterly unlikable screaming infant baby child and the way Rei is treated like his expendable seatwarmer simultaneously befuddles you and actually makes you a little bit angry. Your apathetic disinterest gradually begins to transform into a morbid investment in what you hope is the deserved comeuppance of these insufferable children, and when it doesn't come, you are way more riled than you expected to be.

"Wasn't that great??" Feferi enthusiastically asks, however bleary eyed she is as the clock nears one.

While you've heretofore been inclined to be gentle with her, you find yourself incapable of pretending you're not weirdly mad about this shitty anime. "Yo, no, that was fucking bullshit," you say. "Seriously?? Rei worked his fucking ass off to fit in with those shitty children and they just sideline him for that little shitstain?"

"I —"

"Wow, I'm actually mad about this. Rin has a hissy fit because he blows at swimming and everyone just bends over backwards to accommodate this fucking temper tantrum made flesh? No, that's fucked up, dude. Let him take his fucking ball and go home! Jesus, all he did in this entire fucking show was shit in his diaper and strongarm Haru through some toddler level emotional manipulation and they just _reward_ him — at expense of some poor dude who's trying harder than all of them combined? That was some nonsense."

"You don't understand! Rin was their _nakama_ —"

"Their _what_?"

Feferi rolls her eyes. "It's a Japanese word. It can't be translated. It transcends our English concept of friendship... it's really deep."

 _Oh my fucking **God** ,_ Feferi. "They were friends for like half a fucking year in middle school and then he ditched them all to go completely fail at being an Olympic swimmer. That's not exactly what I'd call an unbreakable bond."

Feferi seems to have either run out of arguments or decided that you're no longer worth her time. "Whatever, Dave. You just don't get it," she says, exasperated, and stands up from the couch. She looks to the clock. "I should probably go to sleep now, _I guess._ "

"Yeah," you agree, standing up as well. You're glad to be leaving this argument behind. You will be glad if you never have another thought about this anime again. "Your mother would kill me if she knew I kept you up this late, I'm sure."

"My mother lets me stay up as late as I want to!" Feferi objects, sticking out her tongue. "She'd definitely kill you if she caught you here at all, though, so you better hurry home, right?"

You sigh heavily as the elevator slowly descends to the ground floor. You're more tired than you usually are at this hour; maybe you really are getting old. You slip the security guard in the lobby a Benjamin and tell him not to let Meenah know that you stopped by. You don't realize that the security guard probably thinks you're a child molester until you're back in your car. _Shit._

All in all, Feferi's a good kid. You like hanging out with her, even if she seems to presently be coasting through an especially embarrassing phase of her life. She'll get over it, you're sure.

If this is the worst you have to look forward to, maybe it won't be so bad.

 

15.

 

It's not so bad.

It's a chilly day in November, a few weeks before your own birthday. You're not there.

You were in a marketing meeting for the release of the next SBaHJ when you got the call. You tell Jade later that you didn't hear your phone vibrate, the conference went long, and there was bad traffic on the way back. Honestly, you spent another two hours after the meeting in the bathroom of the production studio before you gathered the nerve to drive to the hospital. You didn't expect it to be over by the time you got there.

"Doesn't labor take like... twelve hours?" you incredulously ask the nurse who shows you to Jade's room. 

"It's different for everyone. Your wife was very quick," she says.

You don't correct her.

You're petrified until the moment you step through the hospital room door, and then it all just feels ridiculous. You see Jade and you see _it_ and it's so tiny and small and insignificant. Seeing it in the flesh, it's impossible to conceptualize the terror you'd invented in your mind.

"She's asleep," Jade tells you. Her eyelids are so heavy and her voice is so slurred you're not sure if she's talking about the baby or herself.

"It's a girl?" you ask. Jade didn't want to know the sex of the baby before it was born, apparently to make you more stressed about it all than you already were. You were sort of afraid about it being a girl — if you _had_ to have this thing, you hoped it would at least turn out to be something you could relate to at all — but you don't really think you care that much about it, in the end.

You look at it — at her — you guess she's a person now, and not just an abstract embodiment of your fear of your future — and it all still feels so _unreal._ You have to turn back to Jade before long. "How bad was it?" you ask her. 

Jade looks sheepish. "I, um, I took the epidural."

"I thought you wanted to do a natural birth."

You pause. Jade looks at you, slowly, with a blank expression. "I took the epidural," she repeats. "You should hold her."

You immediately hesitate, the apprehension flooding back. _Oh yeah, you have to participate._ "I — I don't want to wake her up," you object, leaning back. Jade looks up at you and through you. 

You have no choice but to relent in the face of her scrutiny. Reluctantly, you reach out your arms.

She's so light. It's _bizarre._ She stirs, but only slightly; she looks up at you and you notice that you seem to have given the poor kid your weird fucking eyes. "Shit," you say.

Jade chastises you with a weary smile. "Hey, watch your fucking language."

 

16.

 

TG: so  
TG: i have a daughter now   
TT: You do.   
TG: yeah   
TT: Is it as bad as you feared?   
TG: i dont know  
TG: i mean  
TG: nothing could have been as bad as i feared i fucking worked myself into a hysteria  
TG: so  
TG: no its not as bad as that  
TG: but i still dont know if im happy about it   
TT: I think you'll be fine.   
TG: how do you know   
TT: It's just the way things are.  
TT: When you take care of something, even if it's hard and time consuming and not very much fun, you'll learn to love it.  
TT: Call it an instinct of rigorous self-justification in the face of buyer's remorse, if you will.  
TT: I'm sure the kid will grow on you.   
TG: maybe  
TG: but thats not the only thing im worried about   
TT: What else is bothering you?   
TG: i dont think jade is ever really going to forgive me for fighting her  
TG: even if i get used to it its like  
TG: i made it pretty damn clear i didnt want any part of it   
TT: But you did stay in the end.   
TG: yeah but i pretty much told her point blank the only reason i was staying was that itd look bad in the fucking tabloids if i didnt   
TT: Oh, Dave.  
TT: You are... not very smart, are you?   
TG: it wasnt like i said it like that  
TG: its just that that is probably what she took away from the several conversations we had where i desperately tried to get her to change her mind by saying shit up to and including the implication that id leave if she didnt get rid of it  
TG: and i didnt just stop after she called my bluff because yes im a fucking idiot  
TG: fuck its not just her i know im never really gonna let go of the fact she completely changed my life without my input   
TT: But she did have your input.  
TT: You put your input into her vagina, in fact.   
TG: oh come the fuck on   
TT: You bear as much responsibility for having a child as she does, but the consequences of any choice she could have made would have affected her twice as much it did you.  
TT: You don't get to have the final say.    
TG: give me some fucking credit rose  
TG: im not some fucking dudebro mouthbreather jesus christ  
TG: can i not discuss this with a woman without you taking it like i just took a huge I HATE WOMEN AND THEIR RIGHTS dump in the middle of the room  
TG: its two thousand fucking fourteen i got the memo on this  
TG: im not contesting that it was her choice in the end but im allowed to be frustrated she didnt give a shit about what i thought at all   
TT: You're allowed, but that doesn't mean I'm going to have any sympathy for you.   
TG: why  
TG: i dont understand how this is so fucking unreasonable of me   
TT: Because I know you, and I know Jade, and I know exactly where this is headed if you truly decide you don't care for the responsibility.   
TG: and where the fuck is that   
TT: You know what?  
TT: No.  
TT: I'm not going to be your prognosticator.   
TG: what the fuck rose   
TT: What the fuck what?  
TT: There's no point in talking to you about it.  
TT: I know you won't listen to a word I say.  
TT: Go make your mistakes, and I'll be here to pick up the pieces when you break.  
TT: But I'm not interested in watching you throw your life in the garbage a piece at a time anymore.   
TG: well thanks  
TG: i thought i might be feeling better but its a good thing i had you here to shit in my mouth    
TT: Have you ever considered what it's like to be in my position?  
TT: Part of the reason I wanted you to see a therapist is that I can't do this anymore.   
TT: I love you, Dave. Every time this happens it makes me feel like I've failed to help you, because you won't let me.   
TT: You're not interested in my help, not really.   
TG: if you cant help me itd at least be great if you wouldnt actively try to make me feel fucking miserable   
TT: I'm not trying to make you feel miserable.   
TG: well that is the effect you are having   
TT: Then I'm sorry.  
TT: I don't want to talk about this anymore.   
TG: neither do i   
TT: Good.  
TT: I'll see you at Christmas.

 

17.

 

"I thought I was fucking free of this," you complain as Jade struggles to figure out how to strap in your daughter's ridiculous castle of a car seat. It's the first time she's been in the car. "Why can't we just do Christmas at our apartment again?"

"Because our apartment is tiny, and everyone is coming to meet Roxy, and —"

"We can't call her _Roxy,_ " you immediately object.

Jade groans, giving up on the seat. "You were the one who wanted to name her after your mother!"

"Yeah, it's similar, but — here, let me try —" Jade sighs and moves out of the way so you can lean into the back of the car. "But not Roxy. We can't use that as a nickname. That's morbid."

"It's not morbid," she says. "Look, see? I tried doing that same thing but it's not secure at all. Shake the base — look! It's going all over the place. This isn't working."

You back up out of the car and open Youtube on your phone. "It's morbid," you declare, and Jade leans in to look over your shoulder at your screen.

"Ohhhhhhh, I didn't know those things were there. That makes sense," Jade says. She hurries back over to feel around between the cushions of the seats. "Aha! Right, okay, so I just... all right. Okay. That's good. We could call her Annie, I guess."

You pick up the car seat part of the car seat with the baby in it and hand it to Jade so she can put it into the car. "I guess," you echo. The baby gurgles contentedly and you pray that that doesn't turn into a screaming fit. "I don't want John's fucking dad to have anything to do with my kid."

You can practically hear Jade's eyeballs rolling into her skull. "She's his granddaughter, Dave," she tells you condescendingly, takes your keys and gets into the driver's seat of the car.

"No she's not," you object. You climb in through the passenger side and do your seatbelt. "He was my _step_ father — and even then not really because I was fucking adopted — and stopped being my stepfather legally when my mother _died,_ so no, he's _not,_ and I don't want him to have anything to do with my kid."

"One, I don't think that's how it works, two, I'm counting him as my dad." She starts the car and begins to drive out of the apartment complex garage. "It counts on my side."

"What? He's not even _sort of_ your dad."

"I lived with him through the end of highschool and half of college! He and your mom pretty much adopted me after Grandpa got sick. He's Dad."

"Not you, too," you groan. You will never fucking understand how everyone just fucking _loves_ that guy.

You're practically sulking through the whole drive to your mother's house. Honestly, you're not sure how Jade is even awake enough to operate the vehicle. You've barely been getting enough sleep as it is and you don't even _do_ post-midnight diaper duty.

Everyone is already there by the time you arrive, even Rose and Kanaya; Vriska is also apparently here, though she seems to have elected to not take part in your welcoming procession. 

The amount of elation you're greeted with is fairly overwhelming. You stand awkwardly aside as you let Jade handle the bulk of the uncomfortable, gushing introductions, but you pointedly decline to let Eridan anywhere near your child. Your hateful glares at least seem to motivate your stepfather to keep things brief. 

Christmas dinner is a shadow of years past. You haven't been back to your mother's house for Christmas since she died — you don't think you've been back to it for _any_ reason since she died, actually. The food is the same, the people are the same, but there's just so much less... production involved. You pass it in tense silence, for the most part, and the others' conversations remain fairly subdued. 

It feels like no time at all has passed by the time you and Jade are settling into your guest bedroom for the night. The baby wakes you up a couple of times, but there have been worse nights. You're actually conscious and ready to leave by ten, miraculously, but Jade sleeps in until after noon.

You're sitting in one of the parlors with John as Jade is preparing her stuff to leave, and you've let John hold the kid. He's pretty good with her, you guess. He's probably end up being a better parent than any of you fuckups, all things considered. Shame about his crazy wife.

Apropos of nothing, it seems John was carrying the same train of thought. "I'm not gonna lie, out of all of us... you were probably the last person I expected to have a kid," he says with a small laugh. The kid has grabbed onto his finger and he's fascinated by that.

"Even after Rose?"

"Uh, yeah. I mean, you both have always been pretty sour on having children, but Rose was never so weirded out about babies. Or responsibility."

"You do know Rose is a lesbian, right?"

John laughs again. "Have you _met_ Kanaya? Like, I don't think they're at that point just yet, but — man, Kanaya is just like... the biggest Mom Person I've ever seen. I can practically hear her biological clock ticking from across the country. They're probably gonna have _twelve_ eventually."

"Oh god. Rose better not expect me to be her fucking sperm donor," you grumble.

Jade comes downstairs with all her bags before long, and you return home.

 

18.

 

You've stopped having sex with Jade.

It wasn't something that you set out to do, exactly. You did it a couple of times after your daughter was born, at least partly to just get it and her obligate body insecurities out of the way — but then you just... stopped.

Jade has never been an especially libidinously forthcoming person. She certainly isn't _frigid,_ but sexual activity has always been something she's expected you to initiate — she's invariably up for it when you're up for it, but when you don't go after it, you just don't have sex.

You don't think about it. Or maybe that's precisely the problem; when you're horny, you just masturbate. Maybe it's just the habit you got into when you had an infant and sex wasn't even a remote consideration for either of you. Either way, if you're left wanting of something, it doesn't seem to be sex with her.

You idly wonder if it does have something to do with how her body has changed since her pregnancy. There's not that much of a difference, though. She's gained a bit of weight, but she probably could have stood to do that besides. She picked up a few stretch marks, but they're fading, and you got used to them pretty quickly anyway. It's not like you can meaningfully detect any difference in elasticity in her vagina. You just don't give that much of a shit anymore.

It's not something that really concerns you until Jade brings it up; you guess you were just dimly laboring under the assumption that sexual fulfillment is wholly male desire. She whispers to you at night, even though your daughter is an entirely different room, like she fears the kid will hear your scandalous adult language, "It's been a really long time, you know..."

"What?" you ask her, blinking the sleep out of your eyes. You were just on the precipice of unconsciousness. "Jade... it's... it's..." You cast around for some indication of the time but your phone is on your besides table and you don't want to expend the energy required to look at it.

"Like 3 AM, I know," she says, still whispering. "But it's been... almost a year. Since we..." Her voice drops to half its volume. "Since we had _sex._ "

You are not nearly awake enough to process this. "I — Jade."

"What?"

" _Now?_ It's... it's 3 AM. I was asleep. I'm still asleep."

"No, not now! But, you know... sometimes... maybe."

"I — all right. Fine, we can... that's fine. I'm going back to sleep, Jade."

Jade lets it drop there. You make a point to start something at least once a month, and try to keep a schedule. When it drops down to once every two, and then three, and then four, she doesn't comment. She never brings it up again.

 

19.

 

"Maybe we should get married," Jade says, and her tone is so nonchalant you almost miss the meaning of the words.

The two of you are sat in the waiting room of the office of the most ridiculously pretentious preschool you have even laid eyes upon — and while that may not be saying much on its own, given that you're fairly sure you've never been inside a preschool before, you are pretty fucking confident that that is an accurately superlative statement. Your daughter is doing a poor job of being awake on Jade's lap.

"I — what?" you respond, looking to her. Did she just... propose?

Her eyes drift down to Annie. "Most people already would be. Some of my friends think it's weird we aren't."

Your mouth opens and closes. "I'd just... never really thought about it," you say. You're not sure that that was the right thing to say. From the look on her face that wasn't the right thing to say. _Shit._

"Do you not want to marry me?" she asks. She's looking back up to you now and like _fuck_ do you feel put on the spot.

"I —"

"Mr. and Mrs. Lalonde?" a voice interrupts you. You quickly look up to see a woman's face peeking through the doorway on the other side of the room. "Ms. Keller is ready to see you now."

You don't get a chance to answer Jade's question, because she immediately stands up and walks to enter the office. You don't have much choice but to follow her.

The interview goes well. You think it's a little ridiculous that a preschool requires fucking baby interviews. You love your daughter, but she's a fucking baby. She doesn't do anything besides toddle around, eat crayons and shit her pants sometimes. She knows like ten words and doesn't even know how to say half of them right. What exactly do they expect from her?

You're a little worried about sending her here, honestly. Do you want to introduce your daughter to a life surrounded by spoiled trust fund kids? It's not like you had a hard life by any means, but you at least learned how to do shit for yourself. You don't suppose you have much of a choice, given your fame.

"I think this place will be good for her. I can tell all the teachers really care," Jade says as you're walking back to the car. 

"Listen, about —"

"Let's talk about it when we've gotten home and put Annie down for her nap."

You feel like you're sitting on pins and needles the entire drive home. You can tell Jade is mad at you. Annie has decided she's no longer interested in napping and is yelling about how much she loves dogs. She _needs_ a puppy, she says. She just learned how to express the concept of "need" and has discovered there is very little that it does not apply to. You're not that enthusiastic about the prospect of getting a dog but Jade hasn't had one since Bec died and you know she'll cave eventually.

Thankfully, all of the commotion quickly tires the kid out and it's not much of a struggle to get her to go to bed. Which is at once both a relief and a source of dread, because it means you now have to talk to Jade.

"We need to talk about this now," you sigh as you shut the door to your daughter's room behind you. You look to Jade and find she seems to have soured on the idea of the confrontation.

"It's not a big d—"

You groan. You can't put up with this shit. "Yes, it is, obviously, to you. And, yeah, if you want it, I'll do it," you tell her.

Of course, that isn't good enough. Evidently she wasn't looking for a solution to the problem, just an opportunity to fucking rag on you. "I wanted it to be something we did because we loved each other," she says. "And not because we had a kid and it just got _weird_ to not —"

"I do love you, Jade," you tell her. You don't know why you bother.

"But not enough to ask me to marry you."

You respond defensively. " _You_ didn't ask _me,_ either."

She starts to say something and thinks better of it. Jade is far from a socially oblivious ditz, but you both know she's prone to falling into the roles that aren't so obviously apparent. The redness in her face is enough indication that it's probably time for you to rescue her from herself.

You, at the very least, allow yourself a dramatic sigh before you drop to one knee. Jade immediately breaks into a grin despite herself. 

"Jade Harley, would you do me the honor of becoming my wife," you deadpan, eyes rolling into your skull.

 

20.

 

You grip the edges of the sink tightly as you stare into the bathroom mirror ahead of you. 

You feel like this is the first time you've really looked at yourself in years. Where the hell did all that time go? You feel ancient — you have lines you don't remember getting and your hair is thinner than it was and you look so, so fucking tired. You don't remember the last time you weren't tired. 

You splash water on your face but you still feel like you're dreaming. There are thirty minutes before the ceremony is about to begin and, while you've known from the beginning you aren't ready, you've never been more acutely aware of it than you are now. 

You wanted to have a private ceremony. Or no ceremony. You don't understand why this or the scale of it so important to her, but it eventually became clear there was no way to argue. You sucked it up and went through the arrangements and all of the rehearsals and now is the day, and all of your friends and family and their friends and family and all the people Jade has ever fucking met are out there and you have to let them stare you in your face and know that you're happy.

Are you happy?

You don't know. You stare into your own eyes. Small droplets of water drip from your eyelashes. _I should probably put on some makeup,_ you think. You haven't cared about that in a long time. It's strange to think that once you did. Maybe you'll just wear your shades during the ceremony after all.

"Hey," someone behind you says, and you nearly jump out of your fucking skin.

You spin around so fast you're surprised you don't get whiplash. "What — what the fuck!?"

You blink your eyes but there he is, stood right in front of you. He's wearing different shades than he usually wears, and he's got a plain navy hoodie up over his head, but there's no mistaking that it's him.

It's Dirk.

He's older, too — it looks like time has given him an even rawer deal than it did you. "'Sup," he says, hands nonchalantly shoved into his jeans pockets. They hang more loosely on him than they used to.

You're lost as to where to even _begin._ Your eyes bug out of your skull as you scramble for something concrete to ask. "What — how the fuck — how did you get _in_ here??"

"Nobody saw me come in," he replies, dodging your actual question.

"How did no one — we have _security_ — god, where _were_ you — I tried so hard to find you, I — why are you here?"

He ignores all the rest to focus on the last. "I wanted to see you again," he says.

"At — at my wedding. You chose here," you breathe out. He's so close to you. You look up at his face and it's _real_ and you almost don't believe it.

"Heh. I knew I wouldn't be able to compete with her, in the end," he says, looking past you to gaze introspectively into his own face in the mirror.

You don't know if you should tell him just how wrong he really is.

Every part of you wants to reach out for him. You want to pull him into your arms and never fucking let go, kiss him and fuck him and just talk to him for hours about nothing at all until the nightmare has passed and you can truly feel fucking _alive_ again. You miss him so fucking badly and you hadn't even begun to understand until your eyes fell upon him just now — you feel like the scar has been ripped open and none of the years of therapy and drugs and time do anything to stop your guts from spilling out.

"Dirk," you mumble.

He turns back to you, but doesn't seem to care about whatever you were going to say. "You have a kid now," he states. It's not a question.

"Her name is Annie," you say. "My daughter. It's — it's short for Roxanne."

You look to him and you expect him to mock you. It's tacky, right? A flood of shame overcomes you that you haven't felt in years. No one has ever made you feel the way he does.

But he doesn't mock you. "'S sweet," is all he mumbles. "Looks like a nice kid."

"She is." You're glad you can at least say that.

"Your life been good?" he asks. The question awkward and stilted. Your answer is twice as much.

"I — no. Kind of. Not really. It's... been worse, though. I don't know."

You can tell from his silence that he understands. Your hands ball into fists at your sides without thought and your nails dig into your palms. It hurts. You want it to.

"Well..."

What the fuck do you say? What do you do? You feel like your brain is about to burst from your skull. 

"I probably ought to get going," he says.

You almost forget that he expects you to say something in return. "Y-yeah," you choke out.

Dirk nods and turns to go. "Maybe another time, yeah?" he says with a shrug; he moves to the door of the bathroom with little hesitation.

"Dirk, wait," you call out. He pauses, turns, looks at you. Your heart stops.

Your mouth opens and closes several times as you struggle to find a coherent thought to put into words. There's so much you want to say and no time to say any of it. Eventually, you settle on, "If you're not going to stay, don't come back at all."

There's a moment of silence between you. You look at him, and he looks at you, and neither of you seem to know where to go from here. Your heart beats heavily in your chest as you wait for him to reply, and your brain works as hard as it can to deny that you want to hear what you want to hear. Eventually, he softly says, "I do too, you know."

That's all. You don't understand. "What?"

It takes a bit for him to get it out. "Love you," he says.

Before you have time to blink, he's gone.

 

21.

 

It's the first time you've been back to therapy in a year. You didn't think you needed it anymore.

"Hi Dave, long time no see!" Nepeta gleefully greets you when you enter her office, though her expression changes when she notices the distress plainly visible in yours. "I guess you're not here for a friendly catch-up..."

It's been two weeks since the wedding and the pressure has yet to abate. You've told no one about it, not Jade or Rose or John, and you don't want to tell Nepeta, not really. But it's continued to weigh so heavily on everything you do and you're afraid if you don't let it out, somehow, you're going to snap.

"He came back," you say as you unsteadily take a seat on the couch in the middle of the office.

Nepeta looks at you with a tilted head. "He?" It takes her a moment. "Oh."

"Yeah."

"Are you all right? Did he threaten you? You're not hurt, are y—"

"He did nothing," you say. "We talked. And then he left."

"What did he say?"

"Nothing. He said... basically, nothing."

Nepeta regards you carefully as she makes a few brief notes.

"What the fuck did I just _do?_ " you breathe. "That's gotta be some sort of sign. About me, or this fucking marriage — maybe I shouldn't have — fuck, I don't even know. If he'd asked me to go with him, I — God, I would've. I seriously would've. I would have left my goddamn wife and abandoned my own fucking kid if he'd said a _word,_ but he _didn't,_ and now I have to live with knowing — _Jesus,_ what the fuck is _wrong_ with me?"

"Dave," Nepeta gently interrupts you. "It's completely natural to have thou—"

You ignore her. "I wish he'd never came back. I wish he'd stayed. I wish he'd never left me and that I never made him go and I wish I never fucking met him at all. I was _happy_ before him — happy with Jade, perfectly fucking content with her, and when I didn't have her all I wanted was her, if he never fucking shit all over my life maybe all of this wouldn't be so fucking — _Fuck!_ And when I was with him, fuck, I was so _miserable_ when I was with him, and I _remember_ how I felt, but none of that feels _real_ anymore. And I have that distance from it where just I think, maybe putting up with all that fucking bullshit was worth it? But I know I'm being fucking stupid, I know even if he came back it would have been the same as it was before, but I don't fucking _feel_ it anymore, and no matter how fucking much I tell it to myself over and over and over again it doesn't change anything because I still remember the good parts like they were fucking yesterday and the bad just keep getting further and further away." 

When your outburst is finished, it takes her a moment to consider her reply. "Are you sure that your feelings for your — for Dirk — are the only thing going on here? Maybe it would be good if you had Jade start coming in as well. I also practice marriage couns—"

"There's nothing wrong with Jade," you sternly cut her off again. "This is my problem. I'm the one who's fucked up."

Maybe Rose is right. You didn't come here to get help and you don't care what Nepeta has to say, not really. You already know what you are.

 

22.

 

It comes in an ebb and flow. One day you're drowning and the next it feels as distant a memory as any other.

You're fine for a while. The next it comes is when you stumble upon it by chance.

You weren't even looking for it, and you don't even remember leaving it there, but there it is. _Pony Pals by Dirk Strider._ You'd forgotten all about it.

There's a little jolt of shock that goes through you when you find it and when you remember it, and all the little things that come with it — you remember that first day in the office reviewing the script on the couch where you caught yourself so close to touching him and knew then that you wanted him. The butterflies in your stomach come back and you can feel the scrutiny of his gaze as intensely as if it were only a moment ago. Your chest seizes with a nostalgic ache equal parts fond and awfully, horribly unwanted.

You flip through the pages of the script absently, drifting by instinct to your favorite parts. You'd forgotten how well done this really was. It may have just ended up an opportunistic stepping stone for Dirk, but you were serious about picking it up and working on it even so. It just got lost along the way.

But here it is. And part of you, the fucking insane part of you thinks, _why not fucking do it?_

You're not sure whether it's out of desire for new project or something much more misguided, but you know then that no matter how stupid it is you want to do it. So you do.

You've been lagging behind on expedient trajectory for the last couple of years' SBAHJ scripts, but the sudden drive to have it all out of the way so you can begin anew invigorates you. It's the first time you've worked on any film that wasn't SBAHJ since, what, fucking 2000? You've been itching for a change of pace for longer than you can remember.

You have the script for SBaHJ 2018 all but finished by your daughter's third birthday and are far enough into 2019's by Christmas to feel comfortable planning for a fall shoot. God knows you'll probably have to _finish_ 2019 before Meenah will be willing to greenlight the production to begin, but it's enough to feel good about moving forward. 

"We'll have to hire more staff," Meenah complains.

"I'll pay them out of my own pocket."

"This'll require a whole new marketing strategy."

"I'll sit the meetings myself." 

"You'll have to organize the casting effort on your own."

"That's fine."

She rattles off objection after objection and you counter them all steadily in turn before she's forced to conclude that there's really no reason why you _can't_ go forward with the project. Pretty much anything with your name on it will make money, after all.

It's more work than you expect. That in itself probably shouldn't have been surprising, given how little involvement you've had in any of your films beyond the writing and directorial aspects since the third or fourth you put out. It's a relearning process, but you relearn it.

In the end, it's just like any other film. You shoot it and you put it out. The critics are moderately baffled. It's so far in tone and content from anything else you've ever done that they don't seem to know what to think about it. It's not a complete monetary failure, but you think most of that is owed to the pull of your name. You don't especially care.

You don't know if you were conscious of it when you decided to make the film, or when you were shooting it or marketing it, but as the dust settles and the finality of it all sets in, you begin to realize you're waiting for something. It's an itch at the back of your mind that you can't escape.

You credit Dirk openly in the film, and the media has a field day with that. A storm of rumors about how you _must_ be having an affair erupts. Jade even sheepishly asks you about it after a time, but you tell her the truth about when you got the script and she lets you be.

A month passes, and then two. You become restless. You have to get back to work on finishing the next SBAHJ script, but it's hard to focus. You check your phone and your texts and your pesterchum and your email and your mailbox and tell Eridan to tell you if he gets any suspicious mail, but nothing comes. You make a couple of vague tweets, about nostalgia and regret, but it doesn't get you what you want.

You eventually come to realize that you are never going to see Dirk Strider again. You try to take the feeling as closer to resignation than grief.

 

23.

 

"What do you _mean_ Snoop canceled?" you demand. 

"You fuckin' dumb, Lalonde?" Eridan crassly replies, apparently oblivious to the rhetorical nature of your own question. "There is literally no other way to interpret what I just said. He's not hosting wrap. The end."

You are just about at your wit's end. This is the third person who had offered space to host the post-filming wrap party, and the third to pull out. As the date looms nearer, you're running out of options.

Over the past decade and a half of producing SBaHJ, your film crew has gained a bit of a reputation for being... unruly. In the beginning it wasn't hard to just find a venue to rent out, but as the damages racked up, you found yourselves consistently disinvited to return the following year. Nowadays, you have to rely on duping some poor schmuck into letting you trash his house, but it seems said schmucks are starting to catch on just as readily as the restaurant and club owners.

"Can you convince him to just let us keep it in the backyard?" you grumble, though you know even now there's not much point in trying to pursue a negotiation.

"He was pretty fuckin' clear about it."

"Christ. Why did he even offer in the first place? He's fucking been to these things, it's not like he doesn't _know._ "

"Wife's orders," Eridan says.

With a groan, you tell Eridan goodbye and hang up. After a short while of consideration, you ultimately conclude you're fucking tired of negotiating and accept that you're just going to do the stupid and easy thing. You leaves your office and make your way over to your room, where Jade is sat on your bed reading a book.

"Hey Jade," you say, doing your best to look contrite. "How do you feel about taking Annie over to John's dad's place for the weekend and staying there?"

Jade looks up at you like you have six heads. It _is_ a rather odd thing for you to suggest. "I — why?"

"I've had three different people back out of hosting the SBAHJ wrap this year and I'm at the point where I just want to open the hall between ours and Aradia's apartments and do it here."

She seems a bit skeptical, but you're actually surprised she isn't more so. You guess she somehow doesn't actually _know_ about SBaHJ wrap. Did you really never bring her? You can't really remember. You guess it was usually your mom. "I... well, okay. As long as nobody breaks anything..."

You don't tell her that they're going to break _everything_. 

 

24.

 

You're drunk.

You told yourself you wouldn't get drunk, but you got drunk. You're not so drunk you can't function, but you're probably too drunk to keep a good watch out for your valuables. You took just about everything you could carry that was out in the open and locked it into Annie's room, but there's plenty left around that you're sure your camera crew could find some way to destroy.

Aradia ended up refusing to let you use her apartment for the party — or, rather, made a number of incredibly subtle objections that required several days of needling until she became willing to actually express her lack of enthusiasm for the idea, after which point you felt obligated to not bully her into letting you fill her apartment with drunk men. You may not have decided to go with this plan if you'd anticipated that she would be unwilling. You don't often factor _Aradia having feelings_ into your machinations, but you noticed you've had to do it more and more as of late. Of course, she tells you nothing.

So, it's a bit crowded, to say the least. You've got your office locked and your kid's room locked and a steadily fluctuating stream of too many people milling between your living room and terrace. People come and go — the film's crew, the cast, various celebrities in the area drawn to the inexorable pull of an industry legend of a train wreck. You do your best to be sufficiently sociable when addressed, but otherwise keep to yourself and your comforting solitude when you can appreciate it.

You really, really miss your mother.

It's been a number of years and you think you've moved on and sometimes it just sneaks up on you when you least expect it. You're standing in the kitchen with your glass of water and you're watching one of your new grips shirtlessly flexing in the middle of your living room and all you can think about is _I wish Mom were here._ Water turns to vodka as if by magic.

Terezi shows up at some point during the night. She doesn't usually come by, but you invited her — you hadn't seen her in a while. You weren't really expecting her to come, but she does.

"This is some party, Dave," she tells you, hanging back in the corner with you as she drinks in the sight of what is now a drunken, mostly shirtless vegetable juggling contest. "I don't know why I don't come to these things more often."

You show her where the liquor is.

"So, how's your life," she smalltalks as the slur creeps into her voice. People have been mostly leaving you alone since Terezi attached herself and psychotic rictus to your hip.

You shrug. "It's all right."

"Jade doing good?"

"Yeah. You still dating Karkat?"

"Yeeep."

The clock ticks into the early morning in a haze. You don't really know when the last of your guests who isn't passed out fucking cold on the terrace limps out the door, but you eventually realize that you and Terezi are the only ones who're left. When enough of your sobriety has returned to you that you're actually aware of where you are, you find yourself listening to Terezi attempting to recall the lyrics of a song.

"I SWEAR to JESUS, this is a real song!! I'm not making this up!!" she hollers, gesticulating wildly. "How have you not heard of this song!?"

"I'm not that into garbage I guess."

"Shut the fuck up Dave. Okay, listen, it goes like this —" She sucks in a deep breath, and her voice returns in a horrible, off-key wail. "C'MON BABY LET ME SMELL YOOOO DIIIIICCKKK."

"Teez, look. Listen. You gotta cut that out. The whole building is gonna hear you. You're gonna wake up Louie and Frank out there —" You gesture towards the chunky pile of men and vomit outside. "— and you can see they're dead fuckin' tired." You reprimand her, but you can't help but burst into laughter as she climbs up onto the couch and begins jumping up and down like a little kid.

"YO WAS ON THE DANCE FLO GRINDIN' WIT SOME STRIPPER HOE NAMED... NAMED DIIAAAAMOND!" She shrieks as she air guitars vigorously. It is clearly not a song that involves any shredding. "I ain't the bitch you wanna play with nigga, DROP THEM BOXERS LEMME SMELL YOOO DIIICCKKK!!"

"Ter—"

"Fuck nigga, you need to stop lyin' for I get mad and pull out my nine!!!" She stops jumping to point a finger gun at you, gives a loud BANG and then promptly resumes a discombobulated dance.

"Terezi, you're a white Jew, stop calling me a nigger."

She sticks out her tongue. You are beginning to realize she does not intend to ever stop.

With a halfhearted sigh, you move over to try to grab her and haul her off the couch. She immediately snatches her wrist out of your grasp, laughs, and jumps out of your reach. You climb up after her, now fully committed to your folly, and chase her over to the opposite end of the couch. She shrieks when you grab her around the waist, flailing and laughing infectiously, and the both of you topple off the sofa onto the floor.

Which, naturally, ends up with her straddled on top of you.

This sure is a thing.

"Hehehehe," Terezi titters as she discovers she has inadvertently found herself in an advantageous position. "Thiiisssssss is no way to treat a lady, Mr. Lalonde."

"Like hell you're a lady." You struggle to extricate yourself from the entanglement, but she's quick to pin your wrists to the ground, and that sly grin she gives you kills most of your will to resist.

She slowly begins to lean in closer to you, the smell of alcohol heavy on her breath. "I think I make a perfectly good lady."

She's certainly doing a perfectly good job of grinding her ass against your dick — which, notably, is also doing a spectacularly _poor_ job of remaining a gentleman.

"Uh, what are you doing?" you ask, like you didn't already know.

"Something stupid."

"I'll say."

She kisses you, and you kiss her back anyway.

 

25.

 

TG: if i tell you something do you promise you wont tell anyone else about it  
TG: ever   
TT: Is this a therapy request?   
TG: jesus christ rose its been like three years since ive asked to talk to you about anything more important than crossword puzzle tips  
TG: will you just cut me a fuckin break   
TT: Ugh.  
TT: I'm going to regret my curiosity, I'm sure: it depends on what it is.   
TG: ok this is really something im gonna need an unconditional oath on because if you sell me out here its gonna be bad news fuckin bears   
TT: Oh boy.   
TG: im SERIOUS if you tell jade about this im fuckin dead   
TT: Dave, what did you do.   
TG: tell me you wont tell her   
TT: Fine. I won't tell her.  
TT: What is it?   
TG: ok well  
TG: theres a possibility i may have sort of uh  
TG: cheated on her   
TT: Wow.   
TG: yeah i know   
TT: "Possibility"? You "may have"?   
TG: ok that was me being cagey i definitely did  
TG: i had sex with terezi  
TG: last night  
TG: my lawyer   
TT: Latula's sister Terezi?   
TG: yeah that one   
TT: Well.  
TT: I'm not sure what you want me to say.  
TT: Congratulations on being a despicable piece of shit?  
TT: Hope the pussy was worth it?  
TT: See you in divorce court?   
TG: come on   
TT: I agreed I wouldn't tell her, not that I'd spare you from a thorough castigation.  
TT: Why did you do it?   
TG: i dont even know  
TG: it just kind of happened   
TT: It "just kind of happened".  
TT: Did your penis just accidentally fall into her vagina?   
TG: we always flirted a lot but it was just like a joke or whatever with us  
TG: i never took it seriously  
TG: i mean i guess i did but i never thought  
TG: ugh  
TG: but then she kissed me and i just kind of went with it and i dont fucking know what im doing rose  
TG: i mean we were both really drunk i think but i probably also wouldve done it anyway if i wasnt  
TG: its not like theres anything wrong going on with me and jade but its like theres nothing right either and its just nothing and bland and im so fucking tired and bored and terezi is fucking crazy and this is stupid  
TG: but now its done and i cant take it back and i dunno what im supposed to do about it now   
TT: Well, what you're supposed to do about it is tell her.  
TT: But you're not going to do that.   
TG: yeah no thatd be even worse  
TG: im not gonna put our daughter through that bullshit just because i had one drunken fuck with my lawyer   
TT: Was it just one drunken fuck?   
TG: yeah   
TT: Is it going to stay that way?   
TG: i dont know   
TT: I'll take that as a "no".   
TG: well i dont want to do anything with her again now  
TG: but i also didnt want to do anything with her 5 minutes before i actually did it with her  
TG: so  
TG: probably   
TT: You can't keep it up forever.   
TG: cant i   
TT: Dave.   
TG: i mean somebody always finds out in the movies and shit but does it actually work like that in real life   
TT: Yes.   
TG: ok well  
TG: i dont really know about that  
TG: because  
TG: it kinda wasnt  
TG: the first time?   
TT: ... Um, what?   
TG: uh  
TG: i did sort of sleep with meenah when i was with jade  
TG: like  
TG: three... times   
TT: Oh my god.  
TT: When was this?   
TG: it was a long time ago  
TG: once after sbahj hit it big  
TG: once when i was drunk  
TG: then once after jade got her discovery gig  
TG: actually  
TG: i think i slept with her twice that time  
TG: since jade was off in australia for like 6 months  
TG: it could have been 3 times   
TT: Holy shit.   
TG: yeah   
TT: I can't believe you would do that to her.  
TT: You know how she feels about Meenah.   
TG: fuck you know how *i* feel about meenah  
TG: it was not a logic-based course of action   
TT: Clearly not.   
TG: jade still never found out about it though  
TG: maybe if i just get it out of my system itll be better in the long run  
TG: and things can go back to normal    
TT: If you aren't happy with Jade you should break up with her, not attempt to salvage the relationship through self-serving excursions into adultery.   
TG: im not unhappy with her though  
TG: its just  
TG: i dont even know  
TG: and its not just about her anymore  
TG: it seems a lot less fucking selfish to cheat on her than to divorce her and ruin my fucking daughters life just because my fucking dick is bored   
TT: Or you could just... not cheat on her at all?   
TG: well its too late for that isnt it   
TT: You could stop before you make it even worse than it is.   
TG: its gonna be bad either way if she finds out  
TG: it wont make a difference   
TT: How are you being such an idiot?  
TT: She's significantly less likely to find out you had a one night stand than she is to discover an ongoing affair.   
TG: but if its not terezi what if its somebody else  
TG: i can at least trust her  
TG: shes not going to narc on me since thatd mean her boyfriend would find out   
TT: Oh my fucking god.  
TT: You're not just cheating on your wife, you are... helping another woman cheat on her own partner.  
TT: This is the most enormous train-wreck I've ever been privy to in my life.   
TG: did i mention her boyfriend is karkat vantas   
TT: I don't even know what to say, other than I should have known better than to even ask.  
TT: This is so stupid it's not even worth the calories necessary to power my brain to think about it.  
TT: I'm just going to shut down my computer, and pretend for as long as I can that we do not actually belong to the same family.   
TG: well  
TG: i AM adopted   
TT: Yes.  
TT: That is a small comfort.  
TT: I'd have thought our mother would have raised you better than to behave in such an utterly abhorrent manner, though.   
TG: ok can we not fucking bring mom into this   
TT: Grow up, Dave.   
TG: what   
TT: You are just... such an enormous child.  
TT: Like parts of your brain are permanently locked in a state of arrested development that retards your ability to do incredibly basic things like treating other human beings with basic decency, or accepting that sometimes you don't always get everything that you want and that being a person means that sometimes you have to do things you don't want to do.  
TT: You are nearly forty years old, Dave.  
TT: Look at yourself.  
TT: This is sad. It really is.

 

26.

 

You fuck Terezi again. You're not going to pretend that you weren't expecting it to happen.

It's gratifying in the moment. Terezi is different and new and old, an experience you've fantasized about but never got to have. She works harder and makes you work harder and you feel a little bit alive, even if you're ultimately left empty when you climb back into bed beside Jade at night.

It becomes an ongoing thing. It feels like it was an inevitability. Meeting with Terezi regularly is easier than you expected it to be, since it turns out she doesn't actually live with Karkat anymore. They found it a lot easier to get along when they both started keeping separate apartments, she tells you. You go to her with no more fear of discovery than you create for yourself.

She tells you a lot about Karkat in the time you spend together. You're a little mystified by how they're actually still together after so long. The both of them have so many weird, fucked up issues that it's a wonder they haven't killed each other. You guess you become her source to vent.

 _She_ becomes the source for all of the fucked up sex things you want to do. You bring up something innocuously kinky one night and her enthusiastic response emboldens you to push further, even for shit you don't think you'd actually like but would have no opportunity otherwise to try. You could probably ask her to shit on your chest and you wouldn't imagine she'd blink.

You... don't ask Terezi to shit on your chest, though.

Terezi is actually the one to bring up fucking you in the ass. You're kind of surprised you didn't think of it yourself, given that you haven't had so much as a finger up your ass since you left Dirk. You've wanted to get fucked for a while, but the idea of asking Jade to do that for you seemed utterly unthinkable. You're not sure she'd even say no, but — there's just something about it you don't _want._ Not from her. You don't understand the mental block, but it's there.

Terezi, though — Terezi is just freak enough for you to go with it.

"Helllll yes," she replies to your enthusiastic agreement, a sharp grin wreaking havoc across her face. "Want to see my dildo collection?"

Terezi's dildo collection is certainly a sight to behold. You were expecting maybe a drawer full of an unreasonable amount of dicks, but even your most ostentatious estimation does not even come close to the enormity that she has in store for you. She takes you to the closet in her guest bedroom and proudly flings open the doors, revealing a meticulously crafted display of dozens upon dozens of colorful alien dicks.

You jaw drops open. Terezi doesn't notice, because she is utterly enraptured by the purported beauty of her possessions. "Aren't they GREAT?" she enthusiastically asks you.

"I — Jesus Christ," you say.

Terezi manages to break her crazy eyes away from her crazy wall of dildos to fix you with a crazy smile. "Okay, what's the biggest thing you ever had up your ass?"

"Um," you start. You're kind of beyond being alarmed by any of the shit Terezi says to you at this point — you just have to think about it. You guess Dirk probably was the biggest? You certainly never experimented with anything thicker than him. "I dunno. A really big dick. I never measured it."

"How could you date a guy with a huge dick and never measure it?"

"I just... didn't ever do that?"

You end up getting out your fucking sex tape so Terezi can analyze the size of Dirk's penis. You're a little weirded out by how not weirded out you are by this.

"That's gotta be at least 9 by 2 inches," Terezi confidently tells you.

"I'm not sure he was that long —"

"It probably looks shorter because it's so thick. But I'm an expert on dicks. I know all there is to know."

You have no choice but to take her word for it.

You let her fuck you. You weren't exactly sure what to expect — you were almost apprehensive to try it, for fear that it wouldn't compare to what it felt like to be with a man — but it's good. Terezi is attractive, and knows what she's doing, and the toy is certainly fucking big enough to satisfy your ridiculous size queen of an ass.

You know the thing that's missing isn't just any man.

 

27.

 

You've never wanted anything more than you want to love Jade, but you don't.

The realization hits you suddenly. The two of you are sat at the kitchen table with your daughter, eating breakfast. You're having eggs and apple juice. You look at Jade across from you and you don't feel anything.

You have no idea when you stopped. You don't know if it was before or after Annie, or before or after Dirk — did you ever _start?_

You think you did. You want to believe you did. But the memory is distant and faded and you're not sure how much of it is owed to your own willful self-actualization; Jade has always been a rebound, as loath as you are to admit it. It feels cruel to think and crueler to accept, but you're not sure if your feelings for Jade in your best days came close to what you felt for Dirk, or even Meenah. Being with Jade is comfortable and easy and you know that she loves _you_ without a doubt, but you don't know how much of that fondness is passion or just the relief of the absence of pain.

All the past aside, the fact remains that you have little will left to fool yourself. 

You go over to Terezi's apartment that night. You tell Jade you're going to a late meeting at the studio, because you know she won't bother to check. She trusts you completely. 

"You ever thought about leaving Karkat?" you ask. Terezi's expression is inscrutable.

"What's this ab—"

"I'm not saying you have to. Or that you should," you quickly cut in. "I was just thinking about... what this is, I guess. I don't know."

Terezi's looks to you with hard eyes, but quickly slips into a playful, if forced, grin. Refuge in facetiousness. "I'm a lawyer, not a homewrecker. There're some small differences." 

You're not sure you've fully realized it yourself until it just comes tumbling out. "I don't know. I think I've been thinking about leaving Jade anyway."

The silence that follows is a bit uncomfortable. Terezi sits up on the bed to gaze down at you, unselfconscious about her exposure. "Don't do that for me," she says, and from her tone you know that it's not a bashful response to a perception of flattery. 

"It's not for you," you tell her, but you're not sure it's for _you,_ either.

 

28.

 

ectoBiologist [EB] began pestering turntechGodhead [TG]

EB: hey!   
TG: sup dude   
EB: my birthday's this weekend.   
TG: yeah i know  
TG: big   
TG: what you think i forgot   
EB: no!  
EB: i was just wondering if maybe i could come stay with you guys for a few days?  
EB: hang out or something.   
TG: yeah of course  
TG: why though  
TG: you sick of being back in sunny washington already   
EB: haha, no.  
EB: i just haven't really seen you in forever, i guess.  
EB: and there's some stuff i'd like to talk to you about.  
EB: i'm going kinda stir crazy and i just wanna get out of town for a bit.   
TG: who died   
EB: nobody died, dave.   
TG: well ok  
TG: when are you coming out and how long do you want to stay   
EB: uh.  
EB: could i come like... today?   
TG: if youve got the plane trip ill get to the airport to pick you up   
EB: ok, haha.  
EB: sorry to spring this on you on such short notice.   
TG: its no problem dude  
TG: youve got a spot on my couch any time   
EB: you guys really need to move into a bigger place. you don't even have a proper guest bedroom now with annie.   
TG: hey i like my apartment  
TG: if you want you can sleep with me and jade  
TG: get a nice sandwich going on  
TG: we could spoon john   
EB: uhhhhhhhhhhh.  
EB: thanks for the offer, but no.   
TG: your loss  
TG: anyway if you dont want the couch im sure i can get aradia to put you up shes got a spare room   
EB: no, it's ok, the couch is fine.   
TG: alright ill get you some blankets and shit  
TG: lemme know when you need me to come get you   
EB: will do.  
EB: thanks!   
TG: sure thing

 

29.

 

It's near eleven PM by the time you arrive at the parking lot of the airport, but the terminal is still abuzz with activity and travelers moving to and from the building. You manage to park your car after a typical amount of airport parking strife. You make the last stretch of the trip on foot with your head down, your hands shoved in your pockets and a prayer that no one will recognize you.

You find John at the terminal without issue and lead him back to your car. All he brought with him was a suitcase so light it couldn't hold more than just a few changes of clothes. He looks older than you've ever seen him, but you don't know whether that's age or exhaustion; he's got dark circles around his eyes and his hair is even messier than it usually is.

"What the hell happened to you, man?" you ask as you slide into the driver's seat of your car. John follows you in shortly after and sighs, displacing his glasses to rub at his eyes.

"Can we talk about it in the morning? I'm so fucking tired."

Despite your curiosity, you take him straight home and show him to his makeshift bed on the sofa. Jade and Annie are elated to see him, and they hassle him for a good fifteen minutes about how he's been and what he's been doing while he gives them evasive answers and just barely manages to look like he didn't wish he were dead — you take pity on him and rescue him from your girls, herding Annie back to her bed despite her protests. You have no idea how her baby ass even managed to be conscious so late to begin with.

"All right, you should have some peace and quiet now," you tell John after shutting the door to your daughter's room behind you. John is already asleep on the couch; the guy wasn't kidding about being exhausted.

You're so very curious when you go to bed.

 

30.

 

"Hey, you wanna go see a movie?" John asks you the next morning, barging into your bathroom while Jade's still asleep and you're brushing your teeth in your underwear. You're startled and nearly jump, but you're smooth as hell and play it off. John's never had that great a concept of boundaries.

"Shit, you've had a change of tune," you slur out from around a mouthful of toothbrush, looking him up and down. He's changed into a fresh set of clothes and his hair is clean and brushed — he must've used the bathroom by your office to shower while you were still asleep. You wonder how long he's been up.

"I just needed the rest. C'mon, I need to get out of the house, I'm going crazy."

"All right all right." You spit out the toothpaste and fill the cup on the sink to rinse. "Just let me shower and get dressed first, I'm not going out in my fucking underwear."

"Okay, hurry up, I'll be waiting for you in the parking lot."

And that's where you find him twenty minutes later, after a rushed shower and the minimum amount of time necessary to do your hair in a manner that is acceptable for leaving the house and leave a note telling Jade where you went. He's sat on the hood of your car and fidgeting anxiously, staring intently at his cuticles as he occupies himself with picking away at them.

You give him a casual wave and unlock your car with your fob. "Yo, Egbert, buckle up."

John hops into the passenger seat and you slide in shortly after him, stick the key in the ignition and start to pull out of your spot. You throw him a quick glance as you pull onto the ramp of the parking garage, making the tortuously slow trip down to the roads. "You have any idea what movie you wanna see?"

"Haha, nah, I don't have a clue what's playing right now. Let's just show up and go to the one that sounds the shittiest."

"Sounds like a plan to me."

And that's just what you do. There's a number of blockbusters about to start by the time the two of you arrive at the cinema, but the siren's call of _Cop Dog 2_ proves too atrocious to resist. You buy your tickets and a copious quantity of snacks — earning several suspicious stares from the employees as you make your purchases, but thankfully no one sure enough of your identity to cause a scene — and file into the theatre with a nearly giddy anticipation just in time for the horror to start.

It's every bit as awful as you thought it'd be. You can't stop laughing at every stupid fucking contrivance, much to the annoyance of the few other groups actually present at the showing — it's mostly just parents with their kids, who look greatly pained to suffer the atrocity but nonetheless unappreciative of the interruptions. Unfortunately for them this shit is just too much for you to handle.

By the time the movie is over you and John are the only ones who hadn't gotten up and left. You honestly don't know whether it's your relentlessly disruptive cackling or the raw shittiness of the movie that drives them out, but you end up with the theatre to yourself and indulge in being as loud as you want.

 

31.

 

You settle down next to John on the hood of the car, staring up at the expanse of sky above you. It's been a long time since you had a good look at the sky, away from all the light pollution of the city — it reminds you of when you used to live deep in those woods of New York, miles away from any civilization. You don't know if you preferred the isolation to the bustle of city life — if anything, being a celebrity has artificially constrained you more than the endless lines of trees ever did — but it does fill you with a fond nostalgia.

Sometimes when your mom was drunk to the point of hysterics, you and Rose would climb up onto the roof and just gaze up at the stars together. She knew all the names of the constellations by heart, but you could never keep track — she'd repeat them to you every time anyway, because even that was a more comforting topic than the alternative. 

If you were an objective man, you'd probably recognize John's father as the best thing that ever happened to your mother. But parts of you will always be a child.

"Hey," John eventually says, breaking through the silence. You turn your head to look to him attentively, and the smile he gives you is painfully sad.

"What's up with you, dude? You've been acting really weird lately."

"It's just... ugh." He pulls himself up to lean his chin on his knee, reluctant to take his eyes off the city below. "Vriska left me."

You sit up after him with a sigh. "Man, I'm sorry. What happened?"

"That's the thing!" John throws his hands up into the air and slides off the hood of the car to pace restlessly. "I don't even know. She just... fuck."

You stay where you are, watching him as he moves. You wish there were something you could actually do to help, but you know from experience there isn't. "Were you fighting?"

"Not at all."

"Was she cheating on you?"

"I don't know, maybe she found someone else, but I don't think so, I — I mean, I sort of saw it coming for a while? It wasn't any one thing. We seriously never fought — everybody always thought that was weird even — it's just like... she got _bored_ of me."

_Oh._

John stops, turning to cast his gaze down onto the city lights again. "After we got married the whole... passion thing just kind of died, you know? We got a house in suburbs and everybody knew her as _Mrs. Egbert_ and goddamn _Dad_ would start asking about kids, and it was just like — she was getting restless? Like the fun and adventure was gone, she hated the domesticity, she'd gotten everything she wanted out of me and so she was done."

You slide off the hood of the car and make your way over to John. "Hey dude," you say; he gives you a look of confusion, and makes a startled noise when you pull him into a hug. He calms quickly, though, and releases a shaky sigh as he relaxes into your arms. "Everything's going to be all right, okay?" you mumble, rubbing his back in what you hope is a comforting gesture.

As the two of you stand there up on that quiet hill miles away from the city, your life seems at once so distant and all the more foreboding. For an instant, you contemplate not even going back — you don't even know _where_ you'd go, but you wish you could be anywhere but here and anyone but you.

You can't, though, so you don't. You take John back to your apartment and make sure he has everything he needs for the night, and then you quietly let yourself into your room so you don't wake Jade up.

You look at her asleep in your bed and a wave of guilt floods you so intensely that it's hard to handle. You reach out to brush a strand of hair out of her sleeping face, and she stirs slightly under your touch. She looks so peaceful.

You climb into bed beside her and sleep more easily than you probably ought. 

 

32.

 

You wake up the day John is meant to leave to a call from Terezi. You're normally a bit difficult to rouse, but the uneasiness of your stomach that sets in when you see her name on your phone's screen jolts you into sobriety.

You take your phone nervously out onto the terrace and glance over your shoulder as you answer, careful to make sure no one is within earshot. You actually suspect Jade went out to take John back to the airport without waking you, since you know his flight back was supposed to be around now and you've obviously slept through it. Even so, you don't want to take your chances.

You lean against the wall of the roof and answer the call, a nervous feeling pooling in your chest in anticipation of what you're about to hear.

"Hi Dave," Terezi says, an uncharacteristic lack of forceful confidence in her voice.

"What's up?"

"Um." There's a brief pause, like she's searching for the right words. "I was just... well. I wanted to talk about us."

"Yeah?" you answer anxiously. Did Karkat find out? God, you knew this would blow up in your face —

"I don't think it's a good idea for us to see each other anymore."

The relief that descends upon you is so immense that you can physically feel the weight being lifted off your shoulders. You release a breath, hoping you didn't sound _that_ glad about it. "Yeah, I was actually thinking the same thing."

"Okay. That's... that's good. Let's just... pretend this never happened, okay?"

"That's probably best."

You don't ask why. You honestly don't even care. You're just so glad to be free of the weight of the lies and deceit and the guilt of the betrayal; all you want is for Jade to be happy because she deserves so much better than this.

 

33.

 

Your intentions are invariably more noble than your actions.

You end up throwing yourself into work. You don't want to think about your problems, so you don't. For the first time ever, you actually agree to look at script pitches; you shift through an endless pile of files until you find one that's vaguely interesting from a screenwriter you've heard of before, and you sign up to direct it for the summer.

Jade is happy for you at first, and you mistake that for encouragement — or maybe just an excuse to pull even further away. You line up another one before shooting even finishes. You've never worked this much in your life and you're surprised to discover how cathartic it is. You get a break to go on a promotional media circuit, and then you're straight back to the grind. 

You find Jade waiting up for you one night you limp home at 2 AM. 

"Dave, is something wrong?" she asks, trapping you with her concern. You think this might be the first time you've actually been in the same room with her while you were both conscious in over a week.

You knowingly dodge the question. "I'm tired," you tell her, which is certainly true in itself. 

"You don't talk to me anymore. I'm worried about you."

"I'm busy." Two words. Noncommittal. You see a little bit of anger flare in her eyes. You know she knows you know what you're doing. 

Her mouth opens and closes a few times before she musters the courage to actually say it. "These — these films you're making aren't... they aren't even _good._ You're not doing them because you want to. What's gotten into you? Is this about me?"

"It's not about y—"

You can visually see Jade's temper begin to take her. Her brow knits, her mouth turns to a frown and she crosses her arms over her chest. "No — no, this isn't about me. God, forget about what _I_ want, what about Annie? She hasn't even _seen_ you in three days! Sometimes I can't get her to go to sleep because she wants to stay up waiting for you to come home! This is ridiculous!"

It's difficult to describe the feeling that comes, partly because it's so morbidly close to satisfaction. It should be perverse even to _you_ to feel good to hear that your own fucking child is suffering, so that can't be it. Is it just because your masochistic self-destruction is finally having its inevitable effect? Is it the relief of knowing that before long all of these precious things you don't deserve will be gone? Whatever it is, it sits smugly inside your gut and festers. Excuses roll off your tongue bereft of a remorse you want but can't find.

"I'm making money so she can have a future."

It's bullshit and the both of you know it.

You can tell that Jade is done with being patronized. You're treating her like she's a fucking moron. "Dave, she needs a _father,_ not a fucking sugar daddy!" she snaps.

You don't know why you're doing it. You don't know why you're saying this shit. Your hands start to shake and your responses become panicked and emotional even though you know you're not even close to being the one who deserves to be upset here. "I _told_ you to get rid of it," you breathe out, a slight tremor to your voice. You can't keep the accusatory tone from your petty, vindictive jabs. "I knew I'd be shit at this, don't fucking put this on me when _you_ were the one who —"

"Put this on _you!?_ How could I put _anything_ on you, you'd have to actually fucking be _around_ for that —"

"I work in fucking Hollywood, what the fuck did you expect!? You _knew_ that when you —"

"That's such _bullshit,_ Dave! You don't have to take on thirty fucking projects a year! You never used to do this! Would it fucking _kill_ you to make some time for your family!?"

You don't know where it comes from, but it pours out of you like acid. "I'd rather be fucking dead than spend another five minutes around _you._ "

And just like that, the fight goes out of her eyes. You didn't know it'd be that easy.

"Dammit, Jade, I didn't mean it, I'm sorry — I —"

She's crying. She's staring at you and she's crying and the both of you are too shocked to even say anything coherent. What do you say after that? You don't know why you said that. It's not true. You don't think it's true. You would have to be a fucking monster for it to be true. What is wrong with you? What the _fuck_ is wrong with you?

Jade flees to your room and slams the door. You imagine she probably locked it, but you don't bother to check. You go to sleep on the couch.

 

34.

 

You don't go in to work the next morning.

Your daughter is shocked to see that you're still there. She sneaks out of her room long before she's supposed to be up and she finds you on the couch, exhausted but restless, and you're caught. You stare at her and she stares back at you, but you say nothing, and she says nothing, until she shrieks and covers her face and runs back to her room.

Jade is up and out in the living room moments later. She looks at you, bleary eyed and confused, and you don't have any explanation for her. She disappears into her daughter's room and doesn't emerge until it's time to take her to school.

You go back to sleep.

You and Jade don't end up talking about what you said last night. It's not as if there's really much to say about it, anyway. It just sort of lingers over your head, unmentioned, and you go back to work. It's another month and you wrap up the shoot and you don't mention to Jade that you backed out of the next one you had lined up. She'd probably just feel insulted. Or maybe that's just what you're telling yourself to stop yourself from doing anything to fix the disaster.

You start to wonder if it wasn't just something that you imagined in a dream. There's a disconnect between you and Jade now, that's undeniable, but if there's any hostility or anger, you don't see it in her. You don't know. The end seems to loom heavily over you all the same.

Weeks pass until you so much as speak of it.

You sit at the table in silence. You knew that something was up when Jade pointedly instructed your daughter to finish up and go to her room.

The distance between you seems to stretch immeasurably despite the modest size of the dining table. Jade quietly eats her meal, polite and with all the proper table manners you'd expect of a high class lady. You'd never know she grew up on an island.

That girl seems like such a distant memory from the woman sat across from you.

You eventually settle into your dish as well, self-conscious of every sound your knife and fork make against your plate. A tenseness permeates the room and you don't even have to be looking at her to be put at unease. There's something coming, but you don't know what. You don't know if you don't want to ask because you're dreading it, or if you really just don't care enough to know.

"I want a divorce," Jade eventually says. She's only half-way done with her food, but she seems to have lost her appetite. Her utensils have been set back into their places on the table, and she looks at you with an expression that's expectant but hopeful of nothing.

If anyone had asked you what you'd feel about this a month ago, you'd probably say you'd be surprised, or that you'd be hurt. But you don't feel anything. She's said the words and you don't feel like anything has changed. Maybe it was just a long time coming. Maybe you never should've married her in the first place.

"Okay," you say. You're not sure what else _to_ say. You go right back to eating your food while she stares at you, unmoving.

"That's it?"

You pause. You look up. You can tell she's struggling not to cry.

"I... if that's what you want, I'm not going to fight you," you say, but the words are of no comfort to her.

" _Why?_ "

Because you care for her but not enough and you just don't have the energy to do this anymore.

"I — I don't know," you answer. Your voice is weak and the words are weaker and she sees through your bullshit even if you don't have the balls to say it.

She covers her mouth as a sob escapes. "God, you don't even _care._ "

"That's not true."

"It is. You don't. This is so hard for me and I — and you — I don't even know. I just don't," she blathers, the tears now flowing freely down her cheeks despite her best efforts to hold them back. She sniffles, picks back up her knife and fork, and returns to eating while she cries. It's a messy and pathetic spectacle and the pity and guilt overwhelm you so badly you can't even watch.

You resume eating just as she did, your eyes glued on the plate before you.

It feels like an eternity before she says another word — she seems to have regained control of herself, though you still can't bring yourself to look at her. "I want full custody."

"... All right," you answer. "I'll give you any money you need. Do you want me to move out?"

"No, I already found a place. It's... it's a house, in Santa Monica. It'll be better for her. I'm moving in Friday. You can see her," she says. "If you want."

You're not sure if your daughter wouldn't be better off if she never saw you again.

"I'll have Aradia help you with your things."

The silence descends again, and it's the most uncomfortable one of all. You still can't look at her and you eat slowly because you're almost afraid to finish before her and be the one to leave the table first — but to your relief, it's not long before Jade rises from her seat and tells you something that means nothing but you'll never be able to forget.

"Put your plate in the dishwasher when you're done."

You sign the divorce papers a week later.

 

35.

 

You spent many years as a bachelor, but your apartment has never felt as empty as it does now.

You'd gotten used to coming home to the commotion. It was only just you and Jade and Annie, but just that kid alone seemed to make your life into a fucking circus.

Now it's... quiet.

Still. Silent. You can hear yourself think and never have to worry about how you look because you've stopped going outside and nobody sees you.

Aradia starts coming around the apartment more often than she usually does. You like to think that it's because she's concerned, but you can never really tell with her. You appreciate the company, even if you never discuss it. She makes your meals, eats with you at breakfast, lunch and dinner, and gives you a wall to talk to despite her personal inability to prove much stimulating company.

It makes you feel better, but eventually you really can't deny how lonely you've become.

Sometimes you lay at wake at night and wonder what your life would be like if you'd done things differently. You talk to Rose about it now and then, but the only real response she can give you is to tell you that you have to let go of the past. You wish it were so easy.

When you think of who you wish were still in your bed and home and your life, you still think of Dirk.

But you can't have Dirk, and you don't want Jade, and you shouldn't have Annie, so you're alone. It eats away at you like it never has before because this time you're critically aware that your isolation is no one's fault but your own. You did this, you fucked up, and this is the price that you pay for being a shitty fucking person.

You wouldn't really say you're depressed, just objective.

Even the shittiest of people still long for companionship, though, and you think of Terezi. You don't really know how you feel about her, or what you felt, or if you would've felt anything at all if it weren't an opportunistic consequence of your situation and misguided impulse. You're attracted to her, but you don't know if you could have a _life_ with her. You don't know if you could have _anything_ with her.

The two of you stopped talking very often after you broke it off. The awkwardness always seemed to pervade every word exchanged, and it became easier to just avoid her entirely. With legal matters you started corresponding through email, each one growing more detached and professional than the last. You'd say you miss her if you were sure you weren't conflating it with desperation.

Desperate you are, though, and so you watch Pesterchum like a hawk for a couple of days. She's stopped logging on very often, but you're online nearly all of the time. You eventually catch her, wait an appropriate length of time to send her a message so it doesn't look like you were waiting for her, and calmly anticipate her reply. You think you would have been nervous, once, but you don't feel much of anything anymore.

turntechGodhead [TG] began pestering gallowsCalibrator [GC]

TG: hey   
GC: HI DAVE   
TG: how are you   
GC: IM OK   
TG: thats good   
GC: IS THERE SOMETHING YOU NEED?  
GC: IM SORT OF BUSY RIGHT NOW   
TG: oh  
TG: i just wanted to tell you something   
GC: ??   
TG: jade and i just got divorced   
GC: OH   
TG: yeah  
TG: so   
GC: SO........ WHAT?   
TG: i guess i was just wondering  
TG: now that im single again   
GC: DAVE >:[   
TG: what   
GC: IM NOT SINGLE   
TG: yeah but like  
TG: it wouldnt have to be a secret anymore  
TG: if you wanted to be with me   
GC: YES IT WOULD  
GC: ITD HAVE TO BE A SECRET BECAUSE IM STILL DATING KARKAT!   
TG: well i was implying if you broke up with him   
GC: I CANT   
TG: why not   
GC: I JUST CANT DAVE   
TG: what is he going to fucking beat you if you leave him   
GC: WHAT!  
GC: NO, KARKAT WOULD NEVER DO THAT TO ME >:/   
TG: then what the fuck   
GC: BECAUSE I DONT WANT TO BREAK UP WITH HIM   
TG: i dont get it  
TG: you guys have been on and off for years  
TG: all you did was complain about how awful he was when we were fooling around   
GC: THATS NOT TRUE   
TG: uh yeah it kinda is   
GC: NO ITS NOT  
GC: HES NOT ALL BAD   
TG: then why the hell did you fuck me   
GC: DAVE THAT WAS A MISTAKE  
GC:   
TG: no karkat is the fucking mistake  
TG: pardon my megalomania but im basically infinitely fucking better than him in every relevant respect  
TG: i thought you liked me   
GC: I DO LIKE YOU  
GC: BUT I STILL LOVE KARKAT TOO  
GC: I REALLY WANT TO MAKE IT WORK WITH US  
GC: ITS BEEN GETTING A LOT BETTER LATELY   
TG: how can you say you love him and then cheat on him   
GC: UM  
GC: THE SAME WAY YOU DID???   
TG: thats not the same thing   
GC: I DONT SEE HOW ITS NOT   
TG: me and jade were on the rocks for years it was already over by the time we did it   
GC: BUT YOU HAVE A KID!  
GC: YOU HAVE A KID AND YOU WERE MARRIED KARKAT IS JUST MY BOYFRIEND   
TG: ok so since i did something shitty too that totally absolves you of being a whore   
GC: OH MY GOD  
GC: ARE YOU KIDDING ME??  
GC: YOU ARE SUCH A HYPOCRITE!   
TG: at least i fucking broke up with jade instead of leading her on and fooling myself into believing it wasnt already fucking over  
TG: but apparently one man just isnt enough for you   
GC: FUCK YOU DAVE  
GC: HAVING SEX WITH YOU WAS THE BIGGEST MISTAKE I EVER MADE  
GC: YOURE A COMPLETE ASSHOLE   
TG: whatever  
TG: fuck you too cunt   
GC: YOU CAN FIND YOURSELF A NEW LAWYER BECAUSE I NEVER WANT TO SPEAK TO YOU AGAIN   
TG: i dont give a shit  
TG: im dave fucking lalonde i can hire any lawyer in the country

gallowsCalibrator [GC] ceased pestering turntechGodhead [TG]

TG: a lawyer much better than you even  
TG: the only reason i even kept you around is because you were hot  
TG: but you turned out to be used up trash so no big loss  
TG: better get myself checked out im probably gonna have to foot the bill of 50 new fucking diseases i picked up from your skank ass

gallowsCalibrator [GC] has blocked turntechGodhead [TG]

When you close out of the Pesterchum window your hands are shaking and you're lightheaded and you feel like you need to lay down, but the physical symptoms are in stark contrast to your emotional apathy.

You really don't feel anything at all.

You objectively know everything you just said to her was awful, but you honestly don't even care. It's like part of you just knows that you're shit, and this is exactly the kind of thing to expect from a shitty person, so why be surprised? That's the kind of shit that petty, opportunistic, hypocritical, cruel, heartless piece of garbage would say. Suits you just fine.

You never tell anyone what happened. She doesn't either. You never see Terezi Pyrope again.

 

36.

 

You wake up late into the afternoon to a knock on your back door.

It takes you a moment to catch your bearings. You are immediately aware of the fact you are not in a bed — you are strewn across the kitchen floor in a pile of your own drool, you ascertain. You don't recall how you got there but it's not difficult to connect the dots.

Disoriented, you pull yourself to your feet. Your head is throbbing. At your lack of reply, another set of knocks resounds against the wooden door, and you hastily stagger over to open it. You find Aradia stood on the other side.

"Hello Dave," she says.

"Hi," you answer.

Aradia declines to comment on the fact that you look like complete shit and steps past you into your apartment. You shut the door behind her. "Do you have a minute?" she asks.

You look down the front of your shirt. You're a mess. "Uhh... I guess."

You quietly follow her to the couch when she moves to take a seat in the living room, and look to her expectantly. She opens and closes her mouth once before eventually asking, "... Dave, are you okay?"

"Yeah, of course," you hastily answer. "I'm the same as always."

In truth, you've been drinking a lot lately. Even by your own standards. You'd say it's because you feel like shit but you really just don't have anything else to _do._ You don't go outside, you don't talk to anyone, you don't do any work because you've dropped all of your projects that weren't SBaHJ and it's out of season for that anyway — so why not be shit piss drunk all of the time? At least you aren't spending that time thinking about all of the shit you've fucked up.

It's been a little while since you've seen Aradia, actually, now that you think of it. Just having her here makes you feel a little high. Your human contact has become so sparse that the prospect of another human being willingly _talking_ to you is inordinately exciting. You really like Aradia. Why don't you appreciate her more? She opens her mouth to speak again but you cut her off. "It means a lot for me that you're looking out for me, but really, I'm okay," you say. Just for once, you want to talk about something other than your own misery. "How have you been?"

"I have... been well..."

"That's good," you say. You look at her and feel a little strange. How long has Aradia been working for you now? You can't even remember. Probably at least a decade. It's difficult to even recall a time when you _didn't_ know her, and it's almost impossible to imagine how you'd get by without her. She's been the most constant and supportive part of your life for years and years and years and it occurs to you now that you've never even thought about how much she means to you. 

"Yes. Dave, I know I am not the best at... expressing emotion, but I've enjoyed working for you very much," she tells you. "You have been a good employer, and a... friend."

"You're definitely the best assistant I've ever had. I mean, it's not like I remember the other ones at all, but, you know." You manage a little lopsided grin. "I'd probably be dead in a ditch by now if it weren't for you."

"Yes. Well. I've been thinking about things for a while. I care for you, Dave. And I don't want to change things between us, but I think —"

"I think I feel the same."

A sliver of confusion you barely catch. "You do?"

"Yeah," you say, and lean forward to kiss her. 

You can't say you've ever seen Aradia look _shocked_ before. She pulls back from you as if she had been burned. The immediate regret descends upon you like a bucket of ice water.

"Shit — Aradia, I'm sorry, I didn't —"

"The reason I wanted to speak with you today is that I'm submitting my resignation," she says, eyes wide.

"Fuck!" you blurt out. Why the fuck do you keep doing these things!? "No, fuck — listen, I know it was stupid and I didn't mean — I will _never_ do it again, I swear to _god_ —"

"Dave, calm down."

"I know I fucked up, I didn't even want to, I just keep doing all of these stupid fucking things and saying things I don't mean and I don't know _why_ but I —"

"Dave."

"— don't want to lose you just because I can't — because I can't help but ruin everything because I'm — please, just give me a second chance —"

" _Dave,_ " she says, more forcefully now, and you finally just shut your useless fucking mouth to stare at her helplessly. "I'm not quitting because you kissed me. I don't care. I'm not mad at you. I understand."

The breath you were holding leaves you. "Then why?"

"I'm moving away."

"Why?"

"Sollux and I —"

"Who the fuck is Sollux?"

Aradia gently takes your hands into hers. It calms you down, a little. "Sollux is my boyfriend. We've been dating for several years now. I believe you met him briefly at the charity event in 2011."

"You mean — you mean _Karkat's fucking assistant?_ " You ask, disbelieving. "That weird looking nerd with the lisp? You're dating _him?_ "

"He hasn't worked for Karkat in a very long time," she says, exhibiting a patience far beyond anything you deserve.

"You never told me about any of this."

"You never asked."

Your unwarranted anger deflates. There isn't much of anything for you to say back to that, really. It's true that you haven't made very much of an effort to engage in Aradia's personal life. Part of you tells yourself that it just didn't seem like your place to intrude, but it's difficult to escape the insinuation that you're just a selfish asshole.

When you fail to make a response, Aradia carefully continues. "He recently got a new job in Silicone Valley, and I've decided that I'm going to move up there with him. I care for him very much. I care about you a lot too, Dave. I've been your assistant for a very long time. I'll come back to visit. We'll always be friends."

"Please just go if you're going to go," you say.

Aradia sits still for a time, your hands still cupped between hers; after a while she seems to conclude that there's nothing more for her to say, so she nods and she withdraws, with only a lingering glance back, and then she's gone.

True to her word, she texts you and emails you and even calls, but you don't return them, and she realizes there is no point left in trying. 

 

37.

 

Losing Aradia is almost as terrible as losing your mother was, but you at least felt justified in your crippling misery back then.

Realistically, Aradia was never your _friend._ You never valued her that much when she was with you. You took her for granted and used her and never made any effort to show her you gave a shit. She was an employee, and not even one you were able to personally connect with at all. You had next to nothing in common; you never got her and she never got you.

Maybe you're just wrecked because you're a fucking lazy, worthless piece of shit. It predictably turns out that doing shit like your own cooking and dishes and laundry and cleaning is next to impossible for you. Every dirty plate in the sink stands as an inexplicably painful reminder of her absence, so you stop using cutlery, or eating much of anything. After all, there's no one to buy you groceries anymore. Shitty delivery pizza becomes the main staple of your diet.

tentacleTherapist [TT] began pestering turntechGodhead [TG]

TT: I heard about Aradia.   
TG: great   
TT: Are you alright, Dave?   
TG: yeah just fantastic   
TT: Dave.   
TG: what rose  
TG: why are you even talking to me  
TG: you dont want to hear about my problems anymore remember  
TG: did you just forget  
TG: have you come by to just taunt me with how much you arent going to listen to me complain   
TT: Christ, Dave.   
TG: christ the fuck what  
TG: you dont give a shit about how im doing so just fuck off   
TT: I do give a shit about how you're doing.  
TT: As evidenced by the fact that I am here now, talking to you, specifically about the topic of how you are doing.   
TG: ok cool  
TG: i just want to skip to the end though  
TG: lets just get it out of the way  
TG: just tell me that im garbage or pathetic or whatever  
TG: like in that special way that you do it where you subtly lord over me how much better than me you are and how much im wasting your time by existing  
TG: im not innately condescending enough to do it justice on my own   
TT: Ok.  
TT: Well.  
TT: Instead of all of that stuff, I actually just came here to make sure that you were managing okay on your own.   
TG: yes you were definitely doing this and not the same thing you do to me every time im upset about anything or want your help   
TT: If I apologized, would it help at all?   
TG: probably not   
TT: Well, I'm sorry anyway.  
TT: You're my brother and I love you, even if I get frustrated sometimes.  
TT: The last thing I want is for you to hate me.   
TG: i dont hate you   
TT: This is pretty hateful behavior.   
TG: fucking look  
TG: see  
TG: that is the exact thing  
TG: its always about how my fucking feelings are personally victimizing you  
TG: and how im a shitty fucking person if i disagree with you or do anything you dont like   
TT: I'm sorry.   
TG: stop apologizing i dont want you to apologize   
TT: Then what do you want me to do?   
TG: nothing  
TG: you should probably just go   
TT: Well, that's unfortunate, because I don't intend to go anywhere.   
TG: why are you so annoyingly stubborn   
TT: I can't help it.  
TT: It's how we were raised.  
TT: Have you been to therapy recently?   
TG: no  
TG: i stopped going years ago   
TT: Why?   
TG: haha  
TG: because i figured out you were right   
TT: Huh?   
TG: that its pointless  
TG: because i never listened to any of the shit she said anyway  
TG: the only thing that helped was the meds but im at least fine enough to function without them now  
TG: for the most part   
TT: You should really consider going back again, after such a big change in your life.   
TG: dude i did fine when my wife fucking left me and took my kid ill be fine after losing my assistant  
TG: im fine now  
TG: its just whatever   
TT: Are you sure?   
TG: yes im sure  
TG: i dont want to talk about this anymore ok   
TT: Alright.   
TG: thanks  
TG: im gonna lay down for a while im kinda tired   
TT: I'll talk to you later, Dave.   
TG: ok  
TG: bye

turntechGodhead [TG] ceased pestering tentacleTherapist [TT]

You obviously aren't that fine.

You think about it for a while. Honestly, maybe going back to therapy wouldn't be that bad of an idea. It would at least be an excuse to get out of the house, and you really wouldn't mind going back on antidepressants for a while.

This naturally leads to you putting it off for several days because the amount of energy required for making a single decision is apparently beyond you. When you finally gather the willpower to call your therapist's offices, you are greeted with possibly the last news you ever expected.

"I'm sorry, sir, but Dr. Leijon passed away a short while ago," the desk girl tells you.

The shock floors you. What the fuck? She was so fucking young. "I — what? Why?"

There's an awkward pause over the phone. "I'm... afraid she was murdered in a drug related incident."

The silence on the phone hangs for a while until, in the absence of your reply, she awkwardly continues, "If you are a former patient and you are in need of a referral, we work with several othe—"

"I, no, that's fine," you interrupt her. "I... Jesus. Thanks for telling me, I guess."

"Have a nice afternoon, sir."

"Um... you too."

You hang up and dimly stare at your phone.

Of course, the first thing you think to do is fucking google her. Several news articles about her murder immediately come up. What the fuck — how did you not hear about this? It was only a few months ago. Christ.

You click through the first link and skim through the details of the article. _Suspect in custody: Gamzee Makara, age 37; history of drug convictions, but no prior violence; motive unknown, but sources close to victim speculate killing was related to a drug prescription dispute; legal defense reports that suspect has history of severe mental illness and intends to plead on grounds of insanity; suspect awaits sentencing._

The killer's mugshot is eerily familiar but you can't place how or why. You quickly close the link.

You don't mention anything to Rose. You don't want to give her the satisfaction of knowing you even called.

 

38.

 

turntechGodhead [TG] began pestering caligulasAquarium [CA]

TG: hey   
CA: whats up   
TG: do you think im hot   
CA: WHOA  
CA: jolly jesuses asscrack lalonde what brought this on   
TG: im drunk and mak ing a bad decision what the fuck did oyu think   
CA: well its not every damn day that your boss cum best buddy of twenty years cum an international fuckin MEGASTAR asks you if you think hes a hottie   
TG: cum   
CA: very mature lalonde very mature   
TG: well do you  
TG: do you want tto t  
TG: touch me   
CA: dang lalonde have some self respect  
CA: i know my bangin bod and charmin personality must be reducin you to a horny quiverin mess but we cant force this  
CA: we gotta take this slow real old fashion like  
CA: im no two dollar hussy im a family man with principles and values  
CA: im talkin about ROMANCE dave   
TG: shut the fuck up eridan   
CA: wow rude   
TG: im not gonna take you out to a candlelight fucking dinner and tell you how much i love you cause i dont  
TG: youre an irritating litle shit and at best im endeared to you t  
TG: hrough familiarityy  
TG: like some sort of unsightly growth on my ass i can t bring myself to get cut off  
TG: f   
CA: ok well that wasnt really the kind of flattery i was hopin for but ill take it   
TG: so do you want to fuck or not   
CA: well   
TG: well what   
CA: i guess  
CA: why the fuck not  
CA: youre cute  
CA: im fuckin gorgeous  
CA: whats the worst that could happen   
TG: this is ltereally the most terrible fuckig idea i have ever had

 

39.

 

Eridan arrives half an hour early in a suit and several pounds of Axe body spray. You very nearly shut the door in his face. 

"You smell like a wet ass," you immediately inform him, crinkling your nose in disgust.

He winks. "A fuckin' _sexy_ ass."

You are already regretting this. You regretted this before you even decided to do it. You're not drunk enough to not know that you will regret everything about this the moment you're sober but you're just drunk enough to do it anyway. 

You're also unreasonably fucking horny. You have not gotten laid since several months prior to your divorce, and with the gaping empty chasm your social life has become, you don't have particularly many options left. Fucking literally anyone else would involve going outside and you aren't down for that. It feels like an exercise in masochism all the same. 

With an ostentatious swoop of his cape, Eridan confidently allows himself into your apartment. He struts about like a peacock, drinking in the decor. "Like what you've done with the place," he huskily intones. You look at him like he's an idiot.

"Eridan, you've been in my apartment a hundred times," you deadpan, quietly containing your exasperation.

"But this time is special. Because this time... is sexy."

You immediately turn around, move to the kitchen and avail yourself of a long fucking drink.

When you turn back again, Eridan is standing _right there._ You nearly jump but manage to contain yourself. You look him in the eye and carefully inform him, "You are going to... you're gonna stop talking. You are not going to say a single word. All right?"

Eridan nods, eager.

You begin a discombobulated stagger in the direction of your bedroom and Eridan follows close behind. When you've made it through the door and turned to face him, he decides to speak anyway. "Ok, I know you told me not to talk, but, I should make it clear. Eridan Ampora —" He takes a deep breath, puffing up his chest. "— is _NOT_ a bottom."

"Fine," you plainly reply.

"I — wait, really?"

"Uh, yeah. Was the plan to begin with, unless you got a microdick."

"My dick is anything but micro!!" he adamantly proclaims.

"Shut the fuck up, Eridan."

Thankfully, Eridan appears sufficiently cowed by your admonishments. You finish off your glass and set it on the bedside table. "Strip," you demand.

You watch Eridan with progressively blurred vision as he does as you command. Unsurprisingly, he does not have much of a physique beneath his clothing. Pale, gangly and bony, he looks as if he never grew out of being an awkwardly proportioned teen. He seems to have yet to become particularly aroused; you're antsy, but you're not packing much of anything either. With the amount you've drunk, it seems to be increasingly likely that that is not going to happen.

You're feeling queasy and disoriented but you beckon Eridan forward anyway. He complies with all of the enthusiasm of the awkward teen he resembles. You settle down onto the bed, and he nervously climbs after you; he tries to kiss you and you stop him. "Just undress me," you say. It's at least partly because you don't think you could undo a belt right now.

You feel like complete fucking garbage. Eridan has apparently never had to unbutton a shirt before and is mechanically moving through each button with all of the finesse of a ham-fisted ape. His hands are clammy and his breath smells weird and your whiskey dick is not even the largest impediment to your arousal. By the time he's begun to awkwardly struggle with your pants, you've had enough. Fucking ugly assholes is supposed to be easier when you're drunk.

"No, no, get off me. Christ," you curse, brusquely pushing Eridan off of you. "This's... is fucking stupid. This is stupid even for _me._ What the fuck."

Eridan looks at you like he's been hurt. "You don't want to do it anymore?"

"No. I don't wanna fuck _you,_ good _lord,_ " you spew. Your probably unwarranted acerbic demeanor is made worse at least in part by the roiling unease in your stomach.

"But I —"

You soundly cut him off when you abruptly lurch over the side of the bed and vomit onto the floor.

"Just put your fuckin' pants back on, Eridan," you weakly tell him, wiping your mouth with the back of your hand. 

Eridan slides off of your bed to collect his pants from the floor in dejection. You sigh and flop back down onto your back, staring up at the ceiling. Dealing with your mess is more than you can manage right now. Your vision is swimming and your head hurts. "I don't know what's with my fucked up brain. Fuck."

"Maybe you should get a new assistant," Eridan meekly suggests.

"Fuck off!" you yell, rolling onto your stomach to shield your eyes from the light. "I don't need a new assistant. Don't _want_ a new assistant. Nobody is Aradia."

The next you open your eyes, Eridan is gone. You don't remember falling asleep and you certainly don't _feel_ like you've slept, but a glance out the window provides a pretty definitive display of the temporal progression that has occurred.

The first thing your mind goes to is Nepeta. You wonder if she suffered when she died. None of the articles described the manner of her death, but you find yourself imagining it from time to time. It's an intrusive thought you can't shake. You can picture her terrified face and hear her screams as she's beaten, stabbed, shot, every manner of a death you can think of, each gruesome and terrible. You'd feel less concerned if you felt concerned.

You lie in bed for a while, riding out the hangover. You know you should drink something — your throat feels like sandpaper — but you can't will yourself to move. You know that pile of vomit is still on the floor but there's nothing on Earth that could move you. You feel useless and lethargic and the longer you lay to rest the heavier your limbs become.

You don't actually move until it's close to evening. Pulling yourself from bed is an arduous effort; your body shakes from fatigue atop a pulsing ache that feels like it may as well be everywhere. You stagger to the bathroom and take some aspirin, and after your first drink of water, you have to stick your head under the tap for what feels like hours until you're satiated.

And that's about as much as you can manage. You emerge, effectively broken. You have to clean up your mess, you have to eat, you have to shower, you have to do this and that and all of it is an unbearable prospect. You grab your phone from where it lay on your table and figure there's probably at least one thing you _can_ do.

turntechGodhead [TG] began pestering caligulasAquarium [CA]

TG: ok well  
TG: i guess i should probably apologize   
CA: probably?????????????????????????????????????????????????????????????????????????????????????????????????   
TG: yeah  
TG: anyway  
TG: generally youre pretty contemptible and i dont have much sympathy for the weird shit you get into but  
TG: this time i was sort of an ass  
TG: like  
TG: the ass  
TG: so  
TG: hope things arent weird   
CA: things are pretty FUCKIN weird lalonde   
TG: yeah i figured  
TG: i legit have no idea why i even suggested this shit other than that im apparently psychotically self destructive so there you go   
CA: listen buddy there is NO EXCUSE for breakin a mans heart   
TG: i didnt break your heart eridan  
TG: you wouldve fucked literally anything that offered  
TG: you dont even LIKE me   
CA: yeah i guess youre kinda a douche now that i think about it   
TG: see thats the spirit  
TG: no hard feelings?   
CA: hmmmmmmm  
CA: maybe you can worm your way back into my good graces lalonde but i got one condition   
TG: whats that   
CA: remember that script i sent you years back???   
TG: bye

turntechGodhead [TG] ceased pestering caligulasAquarium [CA]

 

40.

 

She shows up at your apartment without warning.

"Hi Dave!" Feferi greets you, with a cutesy and enthusiastic wave. "Surprise!"

It's been another long stretch since you'd last seen Feferi, and you're rather relieved to see that the worst of her teen neuroses appear to have past. Her hair is back to its natural color, she's abandoned the obnoxious homemade apparel and she's only wearing _half_ as many shitty plastic necklaces as she might have in years past. "Hey Fef," you say with as genuine a smile as you've managed in a while.

Feferi returns a cheeky grin. "Well, it looks like I'm your new assistant."

Wait, what?

It turns out, you are informed, that Meenah has been made aware of a number of recent developments, including Aradia's departure and the fact that Eridan now assesses you as "in need of help". Great. "My mom is worried that you're going to be overwhelmed by shooting this summer, so I'm interning for her, but really it's for you! I'm getting college credit and everything!!" Feferi tells you.

"And by worried about me she means worried about her profits if I snap in the middle of filming," you dryly reply. 

"When you put it that way..."

You're more angry than you probably ought to be. It's not like you don't enjoy spending time with Feferi, but Meenah's imposition grates. This stands as just one more reminder of how inescapable she is. She won't even allow you your own solitude.

But regardless of what Meenah has done, Feferi has no fault in it. You begrudgingly accept your fate with an aggravated sigh.

"Okay, whatever," you say. Her face lights up. "So, what, are you going to be moving into Aradia's old apartment? I'm pretty sure it's still furnished and everything." 

"As if my mother would let me!" Feferi huffs. "I mean, that would be cool, but it's only for the summer, and I still have classes to take, so... biology SUCKS. Ugh!"

"Didn't end up going to art school, huh?"

Feferi's expression turns sullen. "No. It's not like I was any good at art anyway..."

You are immediately exhausted with yourself when what exists of your meager Parental Lying Instinct kicks into overdrive. "Come on, that's not tr—"

"ANYWAY! Enough about me!!" Feferi brusquely cuts you off. "How have YOU been?"

_Great._

You give her the barebones rundown of your recent life developments, most of which you're sure she's probably already seen in tabloids. Ultimately, you realize you don't have very much to say that doesn't involve the various ways you've ostracized all of the people closest to you. It's a struggle to find something non-awful to talk about. Feferi seems to take your specious assurances of your well-being at face value, though.

After that, it's down to work. Unsurprisingly, while attempting to inform Feferi of the various tasks she'll be performing as your assistant, you discover that pretty much all of them have fallen into dire neglect — you haven't done laundry in weeks, haven't washed a dish or swept or mopped or picked up any of the numerous articles of trash strewn all about the apartment. When you attempt to put together a basic shopping list, it becomes distressingly unending. The months old Taco Bell receipt you picked up off the ground to write it on proves to be insufficient to contain it.

An increasingly daunted Feferi eventually suggests, after surveying the volume of tedious cleaning there is to do, that she tackle the shopping list first. She's rather disappointed to be informed that grocery shopping, or anything that involves going out into public not to an establishment that costs thousands of dollars just to breathe the air, is not a thing that you can _do_ with her. Nevertheless, she is resigned to her boring task, and takes your ridiculous shopping list to head out.

It's a few hours before she returns. She gives you a call and asks you to come out to the parking garage to help her out, so you put on some actual clothes and head down. 

Unsurprisingly, there are a lot of fucking groceries to bring up. "Is there any faster way to get them upstairs than just carrying them to the elevator from here?" Feferi hopefully asks, but you regretfully inform her that there is no such way.

It takes a couple of trips. You'd never really realized how much work this was — Aradia did your groceries mostly while you were still asleep, and never asked you for help at any point. You're only taking up a couple bags at a time and it's not like you're using the stairs, but when you're finished, you're embarrassingly tired all the same.

After gathering all of the bags into the kitchen, Feferi timidly starts in on a line of inquiry you weren't expecting. "Is it true that you and my mom used to... well. You know," she says as she begins to unload the groceries from the paper bags.

"Be together?" you ask. You take a moment to carefully consider your answer, but you eventually conclude there's not much point in withholding the truth. "I guess. Yeah."

She stops, a bag of apples in her hands. "How come you... how come you aren't anymore?"

You have to stop yourself from laughing out loud. _Christ, where to even start._ "People change," you eventually say. In truth, maybe it's more accurate to say that the both of you _didn't._

Feferi doesn't resume putting away the food. A specter of awkwardness descends and you're not sure what to do or say to make this less weird. You busy yourself with putting away crap to alleviate the pressure of her scrutiny. She stays quiet for a long while, before she eventually speaks up in a small voice, "Are you my dad?"

This time you have to look at her.

"No," you answer quickly. You can't tell if the expression on Feferi's face is one of relief or disappointment.

The honest answer is that you really don't know. You used to think she was — the timing is just about right, and Meenah left so abruptly that summer that in hindsight it seemed obvious that she must have ditched you when she found out she was pregnant with your kid. You took that as proof for a long time. But as Feferi grew up to be less and less like you, and the more you grew to hate her mother, the less you wished it were true.

Now you tell yourself she could have been just about anyone's kid. The number of threeways with dudes you had alone could have been enough, not even counting whatever guys she fucked on the side. Meenah was never a responsible woman, and she was an even less responsible girl.

"Oh," is all Feferi finds to say. She looks uncertainly back down at the bag in her hand before putting it away in the fridge, and then returns to store the rest without another word.

 

41.

 

You aren't sure exactly why, but Feferi's presence begins to grate on you. Maybe it's the irritation of knowing that Meenah has forced her to be here, or her unrelenting neediness, or her implacable optimism — you don't know, and none of them seem sufficient to explain the degree of your aggravation.

Feferi is not even half the assistant that Aradia was. That much becomes readily clear. She's not particularly interested in doing any work; she does the bare minimum asked of her and nothing more. She's inattentive, takes breaks to text at least once every five minutes, and clearly just wants to hang out with you, which is something you lacked the energy to do even before she came here and began to aggressively remind you of how irreplaceable Aradia is.

She's invested in your well-being. It's exhausting. When you want peace and quiet, she is in your face grilling you about how "sad" you look. "That's just what my face looks like, Feferi," you tell her, but she doesn't quite seem to ever get the memo.

None of these traits are anything you didn't already know about Feferi. You have known this kid nearly for her entire damn life — you watched her grow up and ride through a number of excruciatingly embarrassing phases far more unbearable than any aspect of her adult demeanor. It never bothered you before. 

Maybe you're just jealous that she's a young girl with her entire life ahead of her.

Whatever it is, the summer is only so long, and it will all be over soon enough. Days roll into weeks into months, and before you know it September is drawing near and you will finally be free.

Feferi evidently has other ideas.

"You know, I was thinking about not going back to school this year..." she tells you idly one day, while she's between doing loads of your laundry.

"Yeah? Why?"

"Weeeeelllllllllllllll," she starts. "I've been working for you for a while, and... well, we've been doing great, haven't we!? You could hire me full time!"

 _Oh good fucking lord._ You sigh and rub your temples. "Feferi, you should stay in school," you tell her, dour. When you look back up at her, her hands are defiantly planted on her hips.

"How come? _You_ never finished college."

You groan, get up from your chair and walk past her out of your office to raid your liquor cabinet. "That's because I'm a fucking idiot, Feferi," you say, and you pour yourself a drink.

Feferi isn't having any of it. "An idiot with... _billions of dollars._ Okay, Dave, sure. Hey, pour me one too."

"You're underage," you say with a sharp leer.

"I'm 20! Come on, I've been drunk before. Don't try to tell me you didn't drink when you were 20!"

You certainly don't tell her you've been drinking since you were thirteen. You sigh, yet again, and move to the kitchen to find something stupid to eat. She follows you like a puppy. It's annoying.

"I could move into the other apartment! This area is super cool, living here would be great. And I've had fun working for you! It's been so good! I don't even _like_ biology. I don't _want_ to go back to school."

Aggravation begins to well in your chest. You can't get rid of her. You grit your teeth and turn back to her, and do the best you can to hide your anger. What comes out is stern exasperation instead, which you suppose is good enough. "Feferi, you're not going to quit school for this job. You'd get bored of it within the year. We both know this."

"Well... I... it's not just the job I want to stay for," she eventually says. Her voice is small. "It's more than that."

You look down at her critically, and she stares back at you with an unguarded face. She walks through life without a concern for who could hurt her.

"Feferi," you say, to break the silence.

She doesn't like the tone of your voice. Her brow knits in concern and her expression turns unsure and nervous. "Dave, I —"

You _hate_ her. You look at her and you can't fucking _stand_ her, you want to reach out your hands and close your fingers around her thin neck and squeeze until all of that life and vitality is gone. It makes you so angry that she can be be as happy as she is, as young and pretty as she is — she looks up to you with wide eyes and all the adoration in the world and it makes you _so fucking angry._

You kiss her.

She freezes under your touch, and you feel her body tremble from the fear but you can tell at once that it's not from unwillingness. When you pull back and look into her eyes, disarmed and stripped utterly bare, you know that she loves you and that she wants you and that being with you would make her happier than anything in the world. She's a fool, a fool and so, so young, and it's with all of the cruelty in your heart that you wrap your arms around her waist when she steps up onto her toes and desperately presses her lips back to yours.

Your hands roam her body and you aren't tender or gentle or loving at all. You grab her ass, squeeze her full breasts as your kisses grow sloppier and rougher and full of tongue and teeth, but none of your coarseness seems to deter her at all. You tear at her clothing, growl low in your throat as you push your fumbling back in the direction of your bedroom. You tumble onto the bed and strip her naked beneath you, explore every inch of her flushed body with your lips — she feels nothing much like Meenah at all with her soft and womanly shape, a stark contrast from what you remember of her mother's taut and wiry muscle beneath your fingers. Feferi has certainly become a very beautiful woman, and you hate her for it.

You fuck her. You pin her beneath you and enter her and she tells you that it hurts but it doesn't matter that you don't care, because she begs you to keep going anyway. You pound into her as hard as you can and bite into her skin and pull her hair and slap her ass and all she does is plead for more. It's her first time and you do all that you can to break her, but she doesn't, and she won't, and when you come inside of her all that's left is that same loving look in her eyes that's been there since she was four years old and you held her in yours arms for the first time. She loves you so much and you hate her for it. 

You lie with her and hold her in your arms until she falls to sleep, her warm body pressed to yours. You pet her long hair and watch her peacefully sleeping face, with her long eyelashes and perfect skin and full lips bruised purple from your kisses. She's so young.

You don't sleep that night. You slip out of bed and take a shower, and you scrub your skin until it's red and raw and then you dress in an old shirt and sweats and sneakers and you leave. It's four in the morning and you run. You don't know where you're going but you run, through the empty sidewalks and across the sparse streets and you run and run and run until your heart feels like it's about to burst from your chest, but you don't stop. You run until your limbs begin to flag, you run until every breath you pull from the air around you is like knives tearing your lungs to ribbons.

You're in a park. You're laying on your back on a bench and you stare up at the starless sky, lightening out of blackness as the sun approaches from beneath the edge of the horizon. 

You think of everything but what you have done. You think about what you're going to have for breakfast when you get home, and you come up with a bit of dialogue for SBaHJ you think is funny. You have a lot of ideas for your next movie.

Dawn has broken by the time you return to your apartment, exhausted and limping and covered in a layer of clammy sweat as every indication of your age and inactive lifestyle. You lean against the wall of the elevator as it slowly, slowly rises up to the top floor, and when the doors _ding!_ and slide open, you drag your body through the hall and in through the door of your apartment. 

When make your way back into your room, Feferi is still asleep in your bed. You shuffle quietly about, dropping your keys and wallet and phone back on your bedside table, but when you begin to strip to return to bed, the girl stirs.

"Dave?" Feferi groggily asks as she yawns and rubs the sleep from her eyes, stretching languidly out across the bed.

You stop and look to her, and greet her with a quiet, "Hey." She smiles at you brightly despite her sleepiness, and grabbily reaches her arms out towards you.

"Come back to bed with me."

"No," you say.

She thinks you're teasing her and she laughs, getting up on her hands and knees to crawl over to you and pull you towards her. But it's not a joke, and you don't think it's funny, and you stand up and step back and leave her sat alone at the edge of the bed.

Feferi's smile fades under your blank stare. It's an odd little thing. She seems to find her modesty in your scrutiny, too, repositioning herself so her arms cover her breasts as best they can — she doesn't seem to want to betray her discomfort by retrieving the sheet to wrap herself, but you can see it on her all the same. "Dave, what's wrong?" she asks you, turning her head to the side. She's fidgeting and restless and confused.

"This was a bad idea."

The fault in her expression cracks into an unmasked despair. It doesn't stop you.

"We can never do this again. I don't want to see you again." 

"... But I love you," she says, her voice so small you nearly don't hear it. Louder than her words, though, are the tears that run plainly down her cheeks — it's the silent kind of weeping, where she wills herself to be as still as possible and betray nothing but she can't control herself in the end.

"I don't," you say. "You're too young for me. I'm old enough to be your father," you say. "This was a mistake," you say. You look down at your hands and they aren't shaking at all.

"I don't understand."

"You don't have to understand. You just have to go," you say. It's like you're watching yourself act, aware of everything but responsible for nothing. You don't know why you're doing anything. "Go back to your mother."

You watch her impassively as the damn bursts. Her silent tears break into a small, choked little sob, and that's all it takes to push her over the edge and reduce her to trembling and wailing, her pretty face contorted into an unpleasant visage of pain. It's ugly to look at. Something wells in your chest that you can't place and your head feels light, but you have no control over anything, no ability to do anything but _watch._ You stare and say nothing as she implores you for a reason, _any_ reason, begs and pleads with you and tells you she loves you until the words mean nothing in your ears. When you offer her no comfort, fail to reveal the nature of some grand jest, she clumsily scrambles off the bed, gathers her clothes and runs from your apartment in tears.

You sit on the edge of your bed and look at your hands.

People have always told you you have nice hands. _They're like a little fucking girl's hands,_ Dirk used to say. You have long and slender fingers with immaculately manicured nails, and your skin is pale and soft and uncallused. You've picked up a few more lines in your age, you notice, and the blue veins under your skin stand out more than they used to, but you still think they're all right. You run the fingers of one over the palm of the other, feeling the patterns of the lines etches across it.

It's strange to think of all the things you've touched with them. You think of how you used to lay in bed with Rose when you were a little kid, and you didn't want her to hold you in her arms, because you weren't a wimp — you'd brave the dark and all the monsters that lurked within it on your own, and you wouldn't need any help to do it. But sometimes Rose would reach out beneath the sheets and take your hand into hers, and you'd tell yourself that much wasn't cheating, and you'd fall asleep with her fingers laced with yours.

You think of what it would be like if you sliced all of your fingers off. You think about punching the glass of your bathroom mirror and taking the shards and digging them into your skin and through the muscle and tendon and bone, one by one, as hard and as long as it took, until you were left with few enough that you couldn't hold the glass anymore. Maybe you'd go down to the parking garage afterward and smash whatever's left into the concrete columns until the bones shatter and the mixture of flesh and blood grinds into paste. 

You don't, though. Nothing happens to your hands. You get up and you use them to get a drink of water. You look closely at how distorted your fingers appear through the liquid in the glass. You dump it down the sink without drinking any of it.

You go into Annie's room and cry yourself to sleep.

 

42.

 

You knock on the door. Again. It's the sixth time, you think. You've lost track. Maybe you're a little crazy, but you've come this far and you're not about to give up now. 

That seems to have been the trick, though. "Oy, I'm fuckin' coming!" you faintly hear through the door, and your heart hammers as the sound of her footsteps draws closer and closer.

Meenah wrenches open the door, and is nearly as surprised to see you as you are to see what she looks like.

Her hair is in tatters, half grown in where it'd been cut and tangled from neglect around braids that have mostly come undone. Her skin looks sallow and dirty, and her clothes — a ratty blue tee and grey sweats — have certainly seen better days. You're not sure whether the smell that hits you when she opens the door is from her, or just the general squalor of her apartment.

But what strikes you most of all is the slight, but certainly noticeable, swell of her stomach.

Neither of you know what to say. The shock knocks the words right out of you. You were so fucking elated in those ten seconds between hearing her voice and seeing her and all of it has gone out of you in a rush. _What the fuck happened to her? Why is she — is she fucking **pregnant**?_

Suddenly it all makes sense. You gape at her incredulously as everything falls into place. _That's why she left. That's why she —_

"Dave," she breathes out, but her face quickly hardens into an unwelcoming sneer. "What the _fuck_ are you doing here?"

"I — I came to find you," you stammer. You can't take your eyes off her stomach. _Holy shit_.

Her voice is quiet, but you can hear the controlled rage. "Thought I made it pretty fucking clear I didn't want that." She follows your eyes self-consciously and adjusts her shirt, but it doesn't help much.

You're so fucking nervous. Getting any words out is a struggle, let alone the right ones. "Latula told me you came to Los Angeles, I —"

"That fuckin' bitch," Meenah groans, and tries to shut the door.

On reflex, your hand shoots out and stops her from closing it all the way. She gives a startled and angry noise, but you plead with her, "Meenah, come on, just let me talk to you."

She stops, and gives you a hard look. You look into her face with wide eyes and as vulnerable an expression as you'd ever wear. She takes a moment to contemplate it before giving a _tch,_ and stops pushing back. You almost fall through the doorway.

She's quick to turn on her heel and head down the hallway of the apartment and you follow her through. There's trash everywhere. You're afraid.

Once you've come to the small living room, she stops and turns to face you. Her chapped lips are drawn into a thin line. "Okay, talk," she says.

What the fuck are _you_ supposed to say? You were the one who came here for answers. You choke out, "You look like —"

"Like shit?" she harshly cuts you off.

"I — I just wanted to understand why you left."

"It had nothing to do with you so don't fucking flatter yourself," is all she says. 

You try a more direct tack. "I want you to come back," you spit out. You're a little surprised to hear how angry you sound when the words are out of your mouth, but your fury rises fairly easily in the face of her hostility.

Meenah laughs in your face.

You open your mouth to speak again, but you're interrupted when a man steps out from the short hall adjoining the kitchen and living room.

You just about jump out of your skin — and if the suddenness of his presence weren't enough, a thorough look at him compounds your intense level of discomfort. You'd probably estimate this guy to be in his late forties or fifties. He has greying brown hair, thin at the crown, and a scratchy beard that extends the length of his several chins. His white shirt — at least, it might have been white at some point in its life — stretches thin over his voluminous belly. His lips look to be covered in scabs and his fat, stubby fingers are similarly dotted with welts and cuts. You feel viscerally ill when you look at him.

"What's all the commotion?" he asks. There's far too much saliva in his voice.

"Sup, Joe," Meenah greets him with a familiar upward tilt of her head. She's evidently not fazed by him at all. "This's my _friend,_ Dave."

You stare at Joe as he lumbers over to the large reclining chair besides you and sits down. He cracks open the beer in his hand and takes several long gulps from the can. You're transfixed in horror.

Meenah sits on the couch across from him. You stand where you are, petrified. You don't move until Joe graciously gestures to you, "C'mon, sit down. Make yourself at home." His speech is slow and measured and deeply unsettling. 

You sit down next to Meenah on the couch, leaving a comfortable distance between you. You can't look away from Joe and feel acutely terrified that you aren't going to make it out of this alive.

"So," he begins, settling comfortably into his seat. "How do you know my sweet little Meenah?" He runs his tongue over his lips at the end of every sentence.

 _His sweet little_ — it's only your fucking horror that stops you from lashing out. "We went to college together," you eke out. Watching him makes your own lips feel dry and you lick them reflexively and mentally kick yourself when you do.

Joe nods, like that was an acceptable answer. You look to Meenah for some sort of indication of what is going on but her face is carefully blank. "We used to fuck," she supplies. You practically choke.

"Is that why he's come here? To fuck?" Joe asks.

Meenah looks back at you. "I dunno. Is it?"

"I —"

She shifts, sidling towards you. Her hand comes to gingerly rest atop your thigh. Your heart beats rapidly in your chest as her face inches nearer.

"This's what you wanted, ain't it?" she whispers. Her breath stinks. "You missed my _pussy._ " You want to vomit.

"I — No, I — this isn't —"

Your protests die in your throat as Meenah clambers astride your lap. One of her hands pins your shoulder against the back of the couch and you can feel it tremble, but her face doesn't betray anything. "You always been so fuckin' _hungry,_ Dave," she tells you, voice growing erratic. The hair on the back of your neck stands on end as her other hand suddenly gropes your junk. "Always needing a good _fuck._ You just couldn't stay away, yeah?"

"Meenah, stop it. Stop it," you plead with her. You're too fucking terrified to stop her. What is that guy going to do if you stop her? Is he going to hurt you? Is he going to hurt her? _Why can't you fucking move?_

"Oh, babe, you know you want it." Oh god, she — "Just look at this. Mmn. Already this fucking hard." Her hand has slipped beneath the waistband of your pants and you can feel her blunt nails scrape against you. Your reaction is wholly involuntary, but that doesn't seem to matter to her. She laughs at you. It's an utterly hollow sound her eyes don't reflect.

She awkwardly shifts herself to remove her pants. You watch her like it isn't happening. She takes your hand and presses your palm fully against her; your hand comes away dry. "Meenah —"

"Just shut up," she tells you. There's an edge of anger to her voice and you see her face and there's a bit of a crack, just a little — you don't know if what you see behind the mask is hatred or fear. "Just shut the fuck up," she tells you. 

You shut the fuck up and you let her do it. You don't know what will happen if you don't — maybe nothing will happen to you, but she must have a reason. You don't want to believe she's trying to hurt you.

She hurts you. She digs her fingers into your shoulders in a vice grip and she sinks down, slowly, and you think painfully. It doesn't go in all the way. You may as well be fucking a sandcastle.

"Come on, Dave," she whispers to you, gentler now. ”Baby. Don't you want me?"

It's not a question. You aren't supposed to refuse. "I — yeah."

"Tell me you want me."

"I want you," you surrender.

She kisses you. Her lips are dried and chapped and it's nothing like the way she kisses you; her forceful confidence is supplanted by a feeble desperation but you don't know what she expects from you. You reciprocate, unsure, and do your best to support her as she moves. It's startling every time her stomach brushes against yours.

It gets a little easier, for the both of you. You shut your eyes and try to forget where you are and what you're doing. You listen to her forced, exaggerated moans and imagine they're real, and that you're back home, and that she never left you and you never fucking came here like the fucking idiot you are.

You ejaculate. It would be difficult to describe it in any term less clinical than that. Your body is physically stimulated to a pleasureless climax and you discharge. Meenah stills when you're spent and withdraws, evidently uninterested in finishing herself off. You watch in a morbid fixation when she leisurely takes a seat next to you on the couch and makes a show of repeatedly swiping her fingers through your mess to bring to her mouth. The sight is nauseating. 

It eventually reaches the point where you can't avoid it any longer. Your eyes slowly shift to look at Joe. He hasn't said or done anything, but you almost think that seeing him actively masturbating would be less unsettling than his unwavering stare.

"Will you be staying for dinner?" he asks.

"Um. No, I don't think so," you reply, controlled and polite.

Meenah stands up, still not wearing pants. A small rivulet runs down her inner thigh. "I'll show you the door."

Slowly, after a moment of deeply uncomfortable staring, you rise to your feet and follow Meenah as she walks back down the hall. When you've taken the final step over the threshold, you look back and struggle to find something to say to her — but in the end, it doesn't matter.

"Get the fuck out, and don't come back," Meenah says, and slams the door in your face.

It's begun to rain.

 

43.

 

The door tears open with the force of a hurricane behind it.

" _You,_ " Meenah snarls, a look of pure hatred etched into every feature of her face. Instinctively, you back up away from her, to escape her balled fists and her palpable, scorching fury, and she advances upon you with a purpose. "What the FUCK!!! What!! THE!! FUCK!!" she screams.

"What are y—"

"Don't _give me that FUCKING shit,_ " she cuts you off, relentless in her pursuit. You've retreated all the way to the living room now and she shows no signs of backing down. Is she actually going to attack you? "She was fucking innocent! How could you fucking do that to her!? All of this, all of this _shit,_ all of our grudges and bad blood and our petty fucking hatred was _between us,_ Dave!"

You've just about run out of anywhere to go. Any further back and you're going to collide with the glass wall. "I di—"

"Like fuck you _didn't._ Shut the fuck up!! Don't fucking SPEAK to me! You are garbage, you are trash, fucking scum of the _Earth_ — anything you could've done to me, it's fair, we've fucking lived that and I can take it but _she_ — but _Feferi_ — she _never_ — that you would break her to hurt me — _she was your fucking daughter!_ "

You're trapped. Your back hits the wall. You stop and you look her rage in the eye and it stops just short of devouring you. "No she wasn't," you say.

_Snap._

Her fist strikes you low in the stomach and your breath leaves you in a gust. It hurts a lot more than you expected it to. Her anger makes up for anything she might lack in physical strength.

 _Let her do it,_ you tell yourself. _You deserve it. Let her beat you until you're bloody and broken and dead because she's right and you need it._

When the second swing comes, though, you deflect it without thinking. Adrenaline surges into you in a flood and with it comes a cruelty backed by years and years of pent up anger and bitterness and regret. It bursts out of you as from a broken dam, and even as your hands tremble you strike back at her with a purpose.

It's a clumsy affair. You're both well past your prime, and neither of you have any sort of martial expertise to speak of — you punch and kick and bite and tear at the whim of your instincts with all of the intent of death behind you. You want to _kill_ her, and you're trying to, and you're sure she feels the same.

You take no concern for any of your furniture or possessions. You slam her head against the back of the couch, and she throws you through the coffee table. You roll through the broken glass and strewn DVDs and your own mingling trails of blood and carnage as you grab anything you can find to use against each other.

It never seems to be enough, though. No matter how many times you hit her she never goes down, and you don't even feel the pain of her countless strikes against you. You're sure your bones are broken and your body is bruised and bloody but it doesn't stop until the both of you physically can't move and you've collapsed numb amidst the wreckage.

You feel good.

You pull yourself up, just a bit. Your back is against the overturned half of the sofa, apparently. Your eyes drift to the ceiling as you hear Meenah rustle beside you to sit, close but not touching.

"I still have dreams about — you know." You lick your lip and taste blood. "It's been... god. It's been twenty years. Every time I think I'm over it I just... I can still smell it. That's the worst part. Some of the other memories have faded, but, the smell — all I have to do is think about it and it hits me so bad and I gag, I want to _vomit._ And everything else comes with it, with the smell. I forget what your face used to look like but I can remember his voice and his breath and the way his eyes — it all feels so fucking _dirty._ I can't even describe it. It lingers."

"I wanted you to stay away," she mutters. Her voice is barely above a whisper.

"Then why did you come after me?"

She doesn't seem to have anything to say to that.

You laugh, a little. It's a bit forced. The motion hurts your body. You're finally starting to feel the pain. "The most fucked up part of it all is that part of me still fucking loves you and probably always will." You wipe your mouth on the back of your hand. You just end up smearing more blood from your scraped and mangled fingers over your face. "If you'd never come back — if I'd never fucking _met_ you — god, my life would be so different. I never would have... none of this would have happened."

She puts on a little smirk, as forced as your laugh. "You really think you would've finished that journalism degree?"

"Probably. It took some fucking serious insanity to get me to go against my mom and drop out. If you hadn't dumped me that summer, I — Jesus, I'd probably be some fucking washed up news anchor at this point, wouldn't I? Or maybe I'd have just given up and leeched off Rose's book money. That wouldn't have been so bad."

"We're really bad for each other," Meenah eventually concludes, after a long moment of silence. You look at her for the first time since you stopped fighting, and wince at the sight of her. She's going to have at least one black eye, you can tell. You hope she at least has the sense not to go into work for a while.

All you can do is keep on rambling. "... I don't think I ever even told anyone this, but SBaHJ was a complete fucking joke. It wasn't some deep political commentary, it was purposefully just bad. It was my fucking Springtime for Hitler. I spent 4 million of the budget casting Ben Stiller and Owen Wilson. I expected to lose every single dime you invested. I never expected — I was ready to throw away my film career entirely because I wanted to spite you so badly."

Meenah shakily climbs to her feet, but it's a moment before she finds the words to speak again. "I know I'm not a very good person," she quietly says. "I know I did shit that hurt you. I hurt a lot of people. But Fef was the one thing I never fucked up."

You stare at her, but she doesn't look at you.

"Figures that you'd be the one to do it for me."

"Meenah, I —"

She mindlessly adjusts the bracelet around her bruised wrist. "Not like I _trusted_ you when I sent her to you, but I thought — all that shit in our past, it was on me and it was on you. I watch my back for all the nasty shit I deserve but I never thought that you'd fucking go there. I never thought you'd do something so fucking — fucking — _evil._ "

"I didn't do it to get back at you," you tell her.

Her head snaps around to glare at you. "Then why?"

You don't have an answer for her. You don't have an answer for yourself.

"We're through," she says, when the only response you have for her is a silence heavy with futile guilt. "For good, this time. I won't work with you again. I won't speak to you again. And stay the _fuck_ away from my daughter."

Her eyes lock with yours for a wordless moment, and then she goes — out the back through the service elevator, where no one will see the state of her. With a heavy sigh, you rise and begin to sort through the wreckage.

 

44.

 

You've decided that you're ready.

You spend a long time thinking about how you're going to do it. You keep going back and forth on what you want it to be like — part of you wants it to be quick and painless, but you also sort of feel like you probably _deserve_ to suffer, like you owe a karmic debt to the world to experience as much pain as possible as payment for everything that you've fucked up.

In the end, it comes down to what you have available. You don't have a gun. You don't think you have the willpower to drown yourself. You could hang yourself or suffocate yourself, but you don't trust yourself to do it right — you don't want to end up living through it with brain damage. That would be much worse than death.

What you do have is a shitload of alcohol and various painkillers, and you figure that you pretty much can't go wrong if you take enough of it. Down a couple of bottles and keep chugging alcohol until you pass out and you should be set. 

You consider whether or not it's worth leaving a note. You don't know what you would say. Most likely, none of the people you've wronged have any interest in hearing some pissy sob story about how sorry you are. Anyone who matters will understand, and anyone who doesn't won't care.

Except for your daughter. She probably deserves to know, but how do you explain death to a five year old? You sit down in front of your computer and try to write something.

Annie,

I don't see you much anymore, but I still love you very much.

You stare at the screen, face blank. The line at the end of the sentence blinks at you unrelentingly. You contemplate what you're going to say for a long time before you eventually backspace what you've written away.

Annie,

I want you to know that this doesn't have anything to do with you.

God. No, that's stupid. You're her fucking father. It has everything to do with her. You never really knew your parents, but you were the same age as her when your bro left you. You know you felt betrayed and unwanted for years. You delete this too.

Annie,

I'm a fucking piece of shit.

Your hands are trembling, but the words come easily.

I'm garbage. I'm killing myself because I'm weak and selfish and I can't deal with living with the consequences of everything ive done and im a fucking stupid idiot who doesnt care about anyone. i obviously dont care about you. i hope you hate me for this because i deserve it and im the shittiest fucking dad who ever lived. i never wanted you. i tried to kill you just like im killing myself because its fucking easy and im a coward. ive never been brave my entire life. everything ive ever had fell into my lap and i never worked for it. ive had chance after fucking chance and ive thrown every one of them into the garbage. im disgusting and mean and i dont appreciate anything i have. i hate myself and never do anything to fix anything because i like feeling sorry for myself. i need other people to solve my problems because im useless and incompetent and now that nobody will im fucking dead so i may as well finish the job. its going to be better this way for you. if i stayed alive i would do nothing but fuck you up. when im dead everyone will forget about me and leave you alone which is probably better in the long run. thats probably the best thing i can do for you. your life is going to be really hard because of me and im sorry and its probably not fair because im not even being your dad. im just some fucking deadbeat loser who pussied out of raising you

You press your palm to your mouth and exhale shakily. You hold down the backspace button until all of it is gone, and you give up. There's not going to be a note. 

You shut off your computer. You go through the whole apartment and make sure all of your electronics are turned off. You pick up some trash, but your apartment is still pretty wrecked from when you fought with Meenah. Eventually, you give up even in that, and go to your liquor cabinet.

You pick the strongest shit you have and chug it from the bottle. It burns unbearably and you choke and gag but you do it again the moment your throat can take it. Waiting until the effects kick in makes you anxious. You pace from the hallway to your office and back again, taking another drink whenever you can stand it.

When you can finally feel it, you take yourself and your bottle and stagger into your bedroom bathroom. You figure you'll take the pills and just lay down in the tub in case there are any... fluids. You set your bottle of booze on the sink counter and wrench open the doors to the medicine cabinet with uncoordinated hands. Reading the labels on the various medications inside are a struggle. You eventually conclude that enough of pretty much any pill should do the job and just grab a bottle.

You put the whole thing up to your mouth and try to chug. A bunch of the pills fall into your mouth but your throat and tongue are too dry to actually swallow them. A few stick in your throat uncomfortably but the rest linger in your mouth, your saliva releasing their intensely bitter flavor. You have to spit the rest out into your shaking hands.

 _Jesus Christ. What the fuck._ You stare at the slimy pills in your hands. You're going to have to take them one by one. You should have brought a cup over here so you could take them with some water. You try to turn on the faucet and remember that the pills are in your hand and some of them spill into the sink and you curse and try to pick them back up, but your hands are shaking so badly and many of them fall down the drain. You give up, and shove your head under the faucet, and the stream of water runs into your nose and makes you panic and cough and sputter and _God, you can't even do this right_ — you grab the bottle of pills again and empty a smaller fistful, and you put them into your mouth and choke down water from the faucet. They still don't all go down in one gulp.

 _Jesus fucking Christ. What the fuck._ You don't know how many pills you've already taken. You look into the bottle and it's nearly full. You don't know how many you need to take to do the job. You thought this would be easier. You aren't drunk enough. You take a drink.

Your stomach is starting to feel uneasy. That's a start, but you wanted to do this faster. You don't want to be in pain. You don't want to suffer. You want to go to sleep and not wake up. You want to be not alive. _You don't want to die._

 _Jesus fucking shit Christ. What the fuck._ You don't want to die. You don't want to die. You've already started and you're going to die. If you don't finish what you started it's going to be worse. You're going to die. Oh god, you don't want to die. You don't want to die. You wish you were dead but you don't want to die. You can't do it. You don't want to die.

You accidentally knock the bottle of pills on the floor and they spill all over the ground. You drop to your knees and scramble to pick them up. You shove them back into the bottle one by one. You're shaking. Your stomach hurts. You're going to die. You don't want to die. Your stomach hurts. You're going to die and it's going to be slow and painful and it's too late to stop it.

You vomit.

The pills, undigested, stand out prominently in the pool of bile on the ground. In any case, it doesn't look like you managed to swallow enough to do anything.

You start to cry. Relief and anger and shame flood you in equal measures. You are so fucking useless. You couldn't do it. You wanted to do it and you needed to do it but you couldn't fucking do it. You curl up into a ball on the ground and tear at your hair and you scream but nobody hears you and nobody would care if they did anyway.

Unsteadily, you climb to your feet. You stare unfocused into the mirror in front of you. Your vision is blurry, but you can see the redness of your eyes and the yellow of the vomit on your chin and shirt and the sallow slickness of your skin. Looking at yourself is unbearable.

You punch the mirror and it doesn't break. Pain shoots through your hand as your knuckles crack and you do it again. You do it over and over and over again until a fault forms, and the glass cracks in a myriad of branches with each strike after that. Blood runs down your hands and through the cracks in the mirror. You slip in your own pool of vomit and fall to the ground.

You're weeping piteously as you drag yourself on hands and knees out of the bathroom. You crawl to your bedside table and blindly grope at its surface until you knock your phone onto the ground. Your hands are in so much pain it's hard to turn on the screen. Blood smears all over the surface when you try to use it.

After a long period of struggle, you actually manage to make a phone call. You pull yourself to your feet as it rings. You bring your phone back into the bathroom and sit down in the tub because your hands are bleeding so much. Blood is getting everywhere. It's going to be such a pain to clean up. You feel sick. You're going to vomit again. Your mouth and throat burn so much.

The voice on the other end of the line immediately takes an agitated tone. "Dave, you know I don't like to use —"

"Rose," you breathe, your voice shaking as much as your body. Her tone immediately turns to one of almost panicked concern.

"Dave? Are you okay?"

You cradle your phone against your ear and pull your legs up to your chest and let yourself slide down the edge of the slick ceramic. "Rose," you repeat, incoherent. "I—"

"What happened? Are you drunk?"

"Yeah," you sniff. You're trying to hard not to cry while you're talking to her but it's impossible and you sob hideously and feel even more ashamed of yourself than you already am. "I couldn't — I c-couldn't fucking _do it,_ I—"

She cuts you off forcefully. "What couldn't you do?"

"I—"

"Did you try to hurt yourself?"

"It doesn't fucking _matter._ I couldn't do it, I'm a, I'm a fucking _pussy,_ fucking piss-ass trash, _fuck_ —"

"Dave, please, don't do anything stupid."

"I just fucking told you I couldn't do it, fuck off!" you angrily yell into the phone. She even makes a little startled noise. "Fuck you and your — and your — _god,_ I just wish it would fucking _stop,_ I'm so fucking — I just _fucking want it to go away!_ "

"It'd hurt me if anything happened to you. Please stop. For me, Dave."

You can't tell whether she means it or if she's just telling you what you want to hear, but you feel like such an enormous pile of shit that you hazard the chance of taking it to heart anyway.

"I'm so sorry," you sob, and you don't know for what, but you have this overwhelming feeling you should be anyway. Sorry for calling her, sorry for trying to kill yourself, sorry for fucking Feferi and trying to fuck Aradia and being awful to Terezi and fucking her and letting go of Jade and Annie, and being fool enough to get married and have a kid at all, sorry for telling Dirk to leave and for fucking Dirk and for meeting him again, and for ever leaving Jade and for every movie you've ever made and for every heart you ever broke, for Meenah, for Ellie in the eighth grade, for John, for Mom, even for your stepfather, for being adopted and for losing your parents and for ever being fucking born because as you lay in this bathtub at one in the morning with shards of glass all around you and not an ounce of willpower to fucking end it, there's very little that you don't regret.

"Shh, it's okay," your sister tries to comfort you. It's not much, but it's an effort, and you do the best to be comforted for her sake, if not for your own. "Just... just calm down."

"O-okay."

"You should go lay down in bed and rest, all right?"

You shakily pull yourself up to stand and step out of the tub, careful to avoid the stray shards of glass. That's quite the feat, drunk as you are, but you miraculously manage to avoid lacerating yourself as you shuffle out of the bathroom back to your bedroom. "Okay," you echo, your phone still clutched close to your ear. You don't want to let go for fear you'll lose her forever. "I'm gonna... I'm gonna lay down now."

"Good. That's good."

You climb onto your bed; you don't have the motor control necessary to undress. Rose reminds you to lay on your side and not your back, and you nod as if she could actually see you. "Will you talk to me? For a little while."

"Sure. Of course." Her voice is familiar and soothing and you missed hearing it so much. "Have you been working on any new scripts lately?"

"No," you answer. You haven't been working on much of anything other than your own misery, lately.

"Maybe you should. Maybe it'd make you feel better to go back to work."

"It doesn't even matter, I — I cut it off with Meenah, so whatever, I can't."

"It doesn't have to be with Meenah. You could find another production studio," she urges. "You're Dave Lalonde. You can do anything, remember?"

"Dave Lalonde is an old deadbeat drunk, he can't ffffffucking do anything," you slur.

"What if I help you?"

You don't see how she could. "Huh?"

"I could come out and stay with you for a while, if you'd like. Maybe we could work on a script together. I think it could be fun."

"Making a script takes forever," you complain. You roll over onto your other side. "You'd be out here for... for _months._ "

"That's okay."

You're quiet for a time. You're not sure how to respond. You want her to come, you miss her and you miss _any_ kind of human contact at all, but you don't feel like you deserve it. You feel like you should refuse and throw your phone across the room and stay where you lie until you waste away into nothing, but even that would take more courage than you have. "Really?" you tentatively ask. "What about, uh... Kayan... Kayaya — Kayanaya —"

"Kanaya," she corrects you.

"Kayayaya."

"... Kanaya will be fine, Dave. We've been together for years, she can manage a few months without me. Maybe it'll even be good for us — a little absence to make the heart grow fonder, you think?"

"You're so fucking gay."

Rose has such a nice laugh.

 

45.

 

Rose arrives the next evening.

She doesn't call ahead or ask you to pick her up from the airport, she simply gets on the plane and shows up.

When you look at her stood across from you on the other side of your door, you can tell she isn't in the best state. Her hair looks frazzled, her clothes are in less than an immaculate state, and there are dark rings beneath her eyes that betray a dire need for sleep. From the looks of it, she drove to the airport the moment she put down the phone and got the first flight she could manage. The gesture means more to you than she knows.

"Hey," you greet her with a tired smile, which she returns with one twice as exhausted as your own. You step aside to let her into the apartment, and take her bags from her to help her settle in. You try not to let the agony in your hands show.

You put her up in the spare room. It used to be Dirk's, and then Annie's, and handing it off to a new resident gets stranger every time. You haven't even gone into the room more than once or twice since Jade left you; it's still very obviously a little girl's room, which is a bit awkward upon its rediscovery. "Sorry about the, uh, all of... this," you awkwardly attempt to apologize; she's yet to comment on the fact that your apartment looks as if a tornado took residence. Rose just waves you off.

"It's fine, Dave. I understand," she says.

The two of you stand for a moment in the quiet, you with your hands shoved uncomfortably in your pockets and Rose with blearily unfocused eyes. She seems to take stock of you for a moment before she asks, "Would it be all right if I'd just had a bit of a nap? I haven't slept and —"

"It's fine," you quickly assure her. You're a bit hung over and you haven't exactly stopped feeling like a piece of shit, but you're not an immediate danger to yourself. "I'm probably going to go back to bed myself. I mostly just... sleep, now."

Rose looks at you with an expression that is positively dismal, and at once you feel the added shame of being _pitied._ It'd be harder to deal with if you didn't so obviously deserve it.

You bid Rose a restful sleep and return to your own room, throwing yourself down onto your bed. The curtains of the glass wall of your bedroom are still open, allowing the bright midday sun in, but you lack the energy to even get up and draw them. You simply pull your sheets up over your head to stave away the light.

 

46.

 

The next you're pulled into consciousness, it's with Rose sat on the edge of your bed.

"Dave, wake up," Rose gently urges you, a soft hand on your shoulder. You groggily open your eyes — you don't feel any more rested than you did before you fell asleep. You probably feel worse, if anything. All you want to do is push her away and go back to sleep but you can't and you don't. You push yourself up, your arms weak from the fatigue, and look to your sister's smiling face.

She looks a hell of a lot better already. She's had a shower and a change of clothes, and she looks far more rested than she did when she arrived. You don't even know how long you were asleep for — it's some time in the early evening, you'd guess from the light.

"My sleep schedule is all fucked up," you remark, your voice scratchy. Rose smiles at you.

"It'll be fun to be back on a night schedule for a while, I think," she says. "Kanaya is such a morning lark that I'd been consigned to a dreadfully bright and early routine for years. Adulthood isn't quite as fun when you can't stay up all night."

You shower and put on some clothes (in the guest bathroom, since your bathroom is too glass-infested to even enter), and then you have dinner with Rose at a quiet little cafe a few blocks from your apartment. Rose insisted that you walk there; exercise is supposed to do wonders for depression, she informs you. You've grown so sedentary that even that short walk is a rather noticeable exertion for you. That's a bit alarming; you're certainly not as young as you used to be, and it isn't as if you were ever the paragon of fitness and good health, but you shouldn't be _this_ pathetic.

If any of the staff recognize either of you, they give no indication of it. Your sister always did her best to keep out of the media's eye, and you look a bit too pathetic to be Dave Lalonde, you suppose. The waitress gives your lacerated hands a lingering look, though. You can feel her disgust. It burns.

You're seated and have coffee and you listen to Rose talk about her life; Kanaya gardens, she tells you, and only grows more and more impressive with every year. It's a bit difficult to farm in northern New York, but her backyard turns out a sizable yield of beets, squash, lettuce and cucumber in the summer months. Kanaya has been trying to convince her to move out somewhere warmer, and so far she's held out, but she doesn't know if she'll be able to deny her much longer.

You have much less to say. Every bit about your life you can think of is so dismal and pathetic you don't even want to bring it up for fear of appearing as some sort of self-pitying sap listlessly wallowing in his own mistakes. Worse, you have no doubt that Rose would know as readily as you do that you're in the wrong.

You try to relate the thing that went on with you and Eridan, but your attempts to deliver it in a humorous manner appear to fall flat given the way Rose's expression steadily hardens through your telling. By the time you're done, you're practically kicking yourself for how fucking ridiculous you sound.

"You tried to have sex with _Eridan,_ " she repeats, scathingly deadpan.

"I — no, I mean — it's not like it went far at all. Fuck, I was drunk. I stopped. I knew it was stupid."

Rose sighs heavily and apologizes to you but you don't know for what.

You're not really feeling much better when you pay the check and leave to walk home. Rose holds your hand on the way back and doesn't comment on the abundance of scabs forming on your knuckles. That does help.

When you return, the state of your apartment is past what you can ignore. Rose somberly informs you that it's really in your best interest to start cleaning up and you can't disagree.

"I don't understand how you even managed to destroy all of this so thoroughly," Rose remarks as she takes stock of the living room. "Did you use a _hammer?_ "

"Oh, uh, I got into a fist fight with Meenah. I didn't do all these bruises to myself."

Rose stares at you, her eyebrows slowly raising.

You shrug. "Had a disagreement."

"... Did you win?"

"Well, she left and never wants to speak to me ever again, so yeah, think that counts."

There's a moment of silence before Rose eventually concludes that she's probably doesn't want to know any more than you've told her. You're sure that's for the better.

You work together to clean up the ransacked apartment. You pretty much have to throw the living room coffee table away, but you find most of the other furniture seems to have survived once you've picked up all of the broken glass and other strewn debris. Cleaning is mind-numbing and dull but it almost manages to take your mind off of your persistent worries. 

You're kind of alarmed to discover how much blood you tracked around the floor of your bedroom and bathroom; it certainly explains the physical fatigue you've been feeling since your botched suicide attempt. You and Rose had kept up some substanceless chatter as you worked on the living room, but as you sit together in the bathroom picking through broken glass and scrubbing your dried blood from the ground, it's difficult to find anything to say.

Cleaning takes what feels like the entire rest of the day. You're ready to go right back to bed by the time you've finished. You just feel exhausted beyond any level of human fatigue. Rose tells you that you ought to take as much rest as you need, and tucks you into bed like a fucking child.

"Would you stay with me?" you ask her as she stands to leave; you're torn between trying to conceal how much of a desperately lonely sack you are and playing it up so she'll feel guilty enough to give in. You can't even imagine what your face must look like.

She stops, looking down to you with a expression perhaps more guarded than she'd like to actually be. When she speaks, it's with a terribly loaded question. "You want me to sleep with you?"

"Not like —"

"That wasn't what I was suggesting," she quickly interjects, clearly placing the blame for _that_ assumption on your shoulders. You'd be irritated by her passive aggressive shit if you had any of the energy for it — instead, you just let your face drop into your hands and release a long, rattling sigh.

No matter how many years go by, you're never really going to be rid of him. You may never see him or speak to him or touch him ever again, but even for the short time he was with you he fucking lingers in the fabric of your life like nicotine stench, indelibly tainting your relationships with everyone and everything.

You only look up again when you feel the mattress of the bed being depressed beneath Rose's weight once more. She seems terribly contrite, and you're almost alarmed when she reaches out to pull you into a hug; it takes you a moment to wrap your arms around her in return, but it's a comfort all the same. She lets you linger like that for a while before she pulls back and tells you that she just needs to change.

You do the same while she's gone; you normally just sleep in your underwear, but you don't want to weird her out, so you dig through your closet until you find an old tee and pants serviceable enough to function as sleepwear.

Rose is back not long later, redressed in a simple black tank and rather gaudily purple plaid pajama pants. You look to her guiltily as she climbs into bed beside you, and pulls you into her arms — you release a tired, tired sigh and relax for the first time in as long as you can remember.

 

47.

 

You're roused from your sleep by the sensation of a notebook dropping heavily onto your chest. "Let's get to work," Rose tells you after your eyes shoot open in surprise.

"Christ, Rose," you curse as you sit up. Rose climbs onto the bed beside you and hands you a pen. You take it reluctantly. "Uh, what?"

"We're going to write a script," she informs you.

You look from the pen in your hand to the enormous notebook that's fallen into your lap. "You seem to be confused," you say. "This is paper."

"... Yes, it is," she responds, eyebrow raised. "Paper is the thing that you write on. This is appropriate, because that is what we are going to do."

"What is this, 1819? Get me my computer." You pointedly thrust the pen back to Rose, who rolls her eyes and refuses to take it. "Don't tell me you seriously still write your books on _paper_."

"My rough drafts, yes," she says. "It's good for you. It paces you and keeps you away from the internet."

"So does not being completely fuckin' ADD," you reply.

Rose decides to just ignore you, and starts. You begin with the very basics — what demographic do you want to aim for? What genre? The both of you just start throwing out the shit you'd be interested in seeing.

You've barely written anything down and it already feels like your hand is about to collapse into itself like a garbage compactor. You can't remember the last time you've sat down and tried to write more than a few words at a time on a piece of paper. It's a more herculean task than you'd have ever imagined. How the fuck did you do this on a daily basis in grade school?

"All right, these dinosaur methods are too much for my young blood," you eventually announce, dropping the pen to shake out your aching hand. Rose looks at you with patronizing concern.

"Don't grip the pen so hard. It shouldn't hurt if you're doing it correctly."

"I'm doing it as correctly as it's possible to do it."

"Maybe you have arthritis. Any of your other bones hurting you lately?"

You roll your eyes with all of the petulance of the 15 year old you apparently are and exert the effort required to retrieve your laptop from across the room where it was charging. Rose gladly assumes her role as a disapproving parent with her stare.

"Dave," she says.

"Rose," you answer, and sit back down on the bed.

The two of you elect to just pig-headedly take separate notes.

You spend some time tossing different ideas back and forth. It becomes apparent very, very quickly that you both have intensely different approaches to telling a story — Rose meets your comedic suggestions with measuredly disdainful dismissal time and time again.

"I don't want to direct some soul sucking Harry Potter wangst fest," you complain, once Rose shoots down your tenth attempt at an idea.

Rose immediately bristles. " _Complacency_ is _not_ Harry Potter. Any similarities are deliberately postured as a post-ironic metadiegesis of the broader young adult modern fantasy genre as a whole and you are well aware of the critical significance of those parallels. I recognize that you are saying this for the express purpose of irritating me, and I resent the childish sentiment," she shoots back, striking out a line in her notebook with murderous intent.

"Sounds like some gay nerd shit," you say.

Your sister smiles as sweetly at you as she can manage.

You kind of feel like you're going in circles at a certain point. Rose isn't interested in your irreverent absurdist humor and you're not interested in her slavish obsession with convoluted dramatic contrivances. You're willing to give up ground, but there's the additional complication that Rose obviously has no idea how to write a constrained narrative.

You spend about an hour spitballing before it eventually becomes clear that Rose has no intention of ever _stopping_ the infinite pile of self-indulgent story concepts from getting taller. You managed to hash out a basic concept — or, at least, you managed to accept that the basic concept was going to be dictated entirely by Rose — and from there, she goes crazy.

"I'm envisioning a four part structure, each part with its own self-contained dramatic progression," Rose announces, eyes scanning rapidly and intently through her increasingly lengthy scrawl of notes. "We'll center each part around a particular historical event as well as common romantic archetype and simultaneously present a deconstruction of both —"

You interrupt Rose, rubbing your temples. "Are you really sure teen girls are the best audience for an 'everything you like is shit' movie?"

"Yes. That's the entire _point_ , Dave," Rose tells you, as if you're stupid. "We will lure them in with a familiar and genre-compliant narrative structure, and then systematically break it down to expose the endemic flaws inherent to the conventions we take for granted as institutions, hopefully educating them in the process."

"Yeah, I, uh, just don't know if they want to be 'educated' enough to spend their moms' money on this. Also, all of this shit is never going to fit into a movie. We have a run time of three hours on the absolute outset."

"I _know_ that. In my outline here I've projected a series of seven films — two films each for parts one, two and three, and one for the fourth and final part," she says.

You look at Rose blankly. "You want me to sell a seven part film series about a shitty vampire being mean to a 14 year old girl."

"No, only the first two movies will be about that — after the first part, once Catherine has been banished from the English clans as a consequence of the escalation of Earl Felding's cruelty, we'll move the focus of the narrative onto the October Revolution, and Catherine-turned-Yekaterina's refuge and ultimate assimilation into Rasputin's clan of vampires. The third... hmm, I'm going back and forth on this on the precise historical event I want to center it around, but there will be a heavy focus on Soviet covert activity in Cold War era America, ultimately concluding in the grave psychological toll the dissolution of the Soviet Union, as well as her human husband's mortality, takes on Catherine, who will conclude the core of the series stranded out of her element in turn of the millennium America. The fourth, of course, will center on Catherine's travels through the afterlife in parallel to The Divine Comedy, guided through heaven, purgatory and hell by John, Vitaliy and Felding, the central male romantic figures of each preceding part."

Your eyes have glazed over and you no longer have the ability to focus on the real world.

"What?" Rose defensively demands of you when you meet her long, droning exposition with silence.

"All of this is going to completely fall apart if you aren't greenlit for every one of these installments," you attempt to tell her.

You can't help but feel an amount of deja vu in the face of her stubborn commitment to the unreasonable length of her film series. "Dave, the both of us combined have substantially more money than God," she assures you. "We can produce quite literally anything we could think of."

"We still need to get a production company to agree to —"

"They'll do anything they're paid to —"

"Okay, no, really, what I'm getting at is I don't wanna make this weird communist vampire heptalogy."

"Oh," Rose says. You can see her visibly deflate. "Well, that's... disappointing."

"Yeah, it's pretty disappointing how you've considered precisely zero of my ideas."

"Those ideas were all ridiculous," she protests.

"Communist vampires," you repeat incredulously.

Rose furrows her brow and looks intently down at her notes. "That's not — it's a different _kind_ of ridiculous."

You sigh and move to shut your laptop in defeat, but Rose catches your hand. "Wait," she says, contrite. "All right, maybe that's unfair — how about we just scrap everything and go back to the drawing board?"

Well, you guess — _what else is there for you to do?_ You relent and start all over again.

 

48.

 

You catch yourself feeling pretty good, and you don't know whether that or your reaction to it is more strange. 

It's difficult for you to remember the last time you were honestly happy, and while you're not sure you would go so far as to say that you are now, it's a startling change from where you were just a month ago. You've let yourself have a little distance from your mistakes, and while it probably shouldn't, it weighs less heavily on your mind. It feels, at the very least, like a start.

After a while, you stop worrying about the script so much. You take things a day at a time. Rose gets you out of the house, and you start doing things like a normal person again. You go to the grocery store. You bring in one of your cars to get a long overdue oil change. You do your laundry and the dishes. You even go to visit your daughter and the anxiety and shame doesn't kill you. 

Eventually the script just stops coming up all together. It's become clear enough to you that your writing styles are just so disparate that it would be a monumental effort to reconcile them enough to produce anything either of you would be happy putting your names on. As it falls to the wayside, up arises the question of when Rose is going to go home. 

You begin to feel agitated over the fact that being around her makes you feel better. When there was a clear end in sight, you at least had the comfort of knowing that her departure wouldn't be any time soon — but now that you've all but given up on the project, she could up and leave at any time and your dependence on her makes you feel vulnerable and frustrated.

It takes you a while to muster up the nerve to actually ask her about it. Rose gives you a long, calculated look, and she tells you, "I'll stay as long as you need, Dave."

The assurance somehow makes it even more stressful.

You feel like a burden. You feel like you don't deserve her. You know that you're keeping her from her life and it isn't fair to her that you're demanding so much of her for nothing in return. "It's fine if you leave," you tell her, one day, as you're sat quietly in the kitchen eating breakfast.

Rose looks up at you from the book she was reading. "Do you want me to leave?" she asks.

"I —" you start. You don't know how to answer the question. You don't want her to leave, but it's a selfish feeling. You think she should leave. You think she should go back to her life and her wife who loves her and forget about you, stop wasting her time and energy on someone so completely hopeless. But it's too much for you to articulate, so you trail off, and you leave her to infer the meaning of your silence.

"I'm not going anywhere until you're ready," she assures you once more. "Dave, truly. This isn't a problem. I'm here for you."

"But Kanaya —"

"My relationship with Kanaya is not in danger. I still speak to her every day. Her mother lives out here, so I'm sure she'll come to visit me before long. And if anything were to happen between us, I assure you that you would have no responsibility in the matter."

You don't know what to say to that. It doesn't seem reasonable that she would be doing this for you. You can't imagine the personal sacrifice to be as small as she says. You're not sure that you're on the same page on the time frame commitment. "I don't know how long I'm going to —"

"However long it takes," Rose slowly repeats, giving you a pointed look that unambiguously spells the end of the discussion. Your gaze drifts down to your plate in your surrender. 

Your insecurity paralyzes you. It's frustrating and embarrassing and your acknowledgment of how unreasonable your feelings are only makes them worse. You become so exhausted with your fucking brain and its inability to just let you have what should be a good thing.

The days roll on. You try telling her that it would be better if she just left. You feel better now, you say. You don't need her anymore. You can put yourself back together from here. It's okay, you insist. Rose laughs in your face.

"Dave, I know you better than anyone," she tells you, gently. "When you're ready for me to go, I'll be able to tell. Don't worry about it."

You're torn between appreciation and resentment. It's a painfully familiar feeling. 

You feel compelled to drink for the first time since Rose came to stay with you. You've never thought of yourself as having a problem with alcohol — it's always been something you've done because you liked it, and you wanted to, and you've never had any trouble controlling when you did it. If you wanted to stop, you did. But you feel drawn to the liquor cabinet now in a way that makes you feel a little wary, and just a little bit frightened.

Alcohol makes you feel good. You know for a fact that it will give you at least a momentary reprieve from the ridiculous unwarranted anxiety that's been fucking you up. You want that — you think it might even help you out long term in putting into perspective just how fucking stupid this is — but there's a fear in the back of your mind you can't push aside.

Regardless, you succumb. It's 4 AM and you're playing video games because you can't sleep, and it doesn't seem like there's any time better than the present. You go through the trouble of mixing yourself up the nice shit — you actually have fluids in the house other than hard liquor and water, now — and allow yourself to relax.

It unfortunately doesn't help you get to sleep any, so you keep playing video games. You've got a shitty racer on now, one of countless you own, probably at least the 37th iteration in its own series. It's a comfortably mind numbing time sink.

You lose track of the time. You eventually notice that Rose has staggered into the living area, bleary eyed and exhausted. You look up to her in surprise, your vision swimming.

"Dave, would you mind keeping it down?" she asks you, her voice scratchy. It's difficult for you to make out the words.

You're right in the middle of a race, so your eyes snap back to it. You don't have the mental faculties required to process both it and her right now. "Give me a minute," you tell her.

Rose eyes you for a moment, before coming to shuffle over to the couches. She slumps down to sit beside you, and watches you play for a while before she speaks. "You're drunk," she observes, with an edge of judgment that nevertheless belies her neutral tone.

"Yeah," you slur. You swerve uncontrollably into a wall and shout.

You are critically aware of her scrutinizing gaze even in your disorientation. Your car has reappeared on the track as the race begins anew.

"Dave."

"What?" you snap at her. "I'm trying to focus. Stop... stop staring at me. You're making me lose."

"Dave, is there something wrong?"

She's starting to put you on edge. You grit your teeth. "It's not fucking illegal for me to be drunk. Fuck off."

Rose turns her head slightly to the side. You can see it out of the periphery of your vision. You try to ignore it as you drive very fast. "It isn't illegal. But I worry about you." 

"Well, stop it. I'm drunk because I want to be. I couldn't sleep. Alcohol helps me sleep, sometimes. Whatever. Fuck!" You throw the controller down onto the couch and Rose jumps. "I keep fucking dying."

"If you want to talk —"

"I just want to win this fuckin' shitty video game!"

Rose gently reaches out to take your hand and you hit it away. She's startled by the outburst, but she doesn't pull back from you; you look to her and furrow your brow and clench your jaw but your fury falters in the face of her resolve. The tension melts off of you in waves, and you slump, and your eyes trail down to your fingers laced with hers. You murmur, "Why won't you just fucking stop? Why don't you just let me be?"

"Because you're my brother. You're my family. Even if you've made mistakes, nothing will change that," she tells you. "I know that it hurts. I know how crushingly worthless depression makes you feel and I know what it's like to not feel like you deserve to get better, but you don't have to worry about me. I'm not going to abandon you."

You let her hug you, this time. You've forgotten about winning your stupid race. It doesn't matter. You draw a shaky breath and let it go.

"I love you, Rose," you mumble. 

"I love you too, Dave," she gently whispers back, brushing a strand of hair out of your eyes. You look to her and her smile is sweet and fond and everything that you've needed.

You ruin it. Part of you must know that it's stupid, even in your drunkenness — it's not as if you haven't begun to notice the pattern. It hasn't escaped you that every romantic blunder you've attempted in the past long, tortuous decade has been an enormous mistake. You understand comprehensively when you reach out your hand to cup her cheek that nothing good could possibly come if it but you do it anyway. Your attempt kiss her is intercepted before you even make contact.

"Dave, what are you doing?" she demands, gone rigid and stern as she tries to push you away.

You know that Rose doesn't have romantic feelings for you, and logically, you can't really process whatever it is you're feeling now as real, either. You've known Rose nearly your entire life and you've never been even slightly attracted to her, so it makes no sense for you to start now — she hasn't done anything for you that's different from the rest of the care and intimacy she's shown you throughout your life. But whatever the fuck this is, it's lingered and it's grown, like some sort of parasite feeding off of your pathetic longing to feel anything resembling love again and all of your sense and constraint are thoroughly overridden by a fugue of desperate, oblivious fantasy.

It's not hard to push past her resistance, since she wasn't expecting you to have the gall to even try. Your lips sloppily connect with her cheek when she reflexively turns her head. You don't know what you're doing. "Dave, Dave, stop it," she demands, the tone of her voice growing more harried. You hear her, and you understand her, but you ignore her anyway.

You've never been particularly strong or physically fit, and you certainly aren't particularly coordinated at the moment, but you still seem to hold a basic biological advantage over her all the same. It's not that much of a struggle to restrain her and pin her beneath you. You kiss her neck and grope her breast. It's not really very sexually gratifying. You don't think you even have an erection. 

Rose herself probably discovers this fact when she kicks you in the balls. The sobering pain shoots through your groin and your stomach and it feels like vomit is about to rise but it never comes; you barely notice it when she dumps you on the ground in the process of extricating herself. The first thing that comes out of your mouth is, inexplicably, a laugh. _This seems familiar._

It takes a while for you to recover. She didn't get you that badly, as far as ball shots go, but it still fucking hurts. When you've righted yourself enough to look at Rose, her hair and clothing are disheveled and she's fixed you with a look of horror that immediately inspires a cold rush of disgust that you're not entirely sure how you didn't already feel. It passes as quickly as it comes.

Rose is shaking. She's staring at you with wide eyes and clearly does not understand what just happened any better than you do. "Dave," she stammers, from a safe distance. "What the fuck was that?"

"I don't know," you answer, and you aren't lying. "I'm drunk." It's the only excuse you can come up with.

"That's not how being drunk works, Dave. It doesn't make you do anything you hadn't already been thinking about."

The only conclusion you can come to is that you wanted to hurt Rose.

It's not like you didn't know. Before, during and after — you knew what you were doing was wrong. You knew where you would be when it was over. It didn't matter when you did it to Terezi or Feferi and it didn't matter now. The only thing that makes any sense at all is that you want her to hate you.

Even in the face of all of your stupid fucking mistakes, Rose manages to have find some small sliver of patience for you. She steels herself and tries to explain, "I don't want to sleep with you, Dave. I don't feel that way about you."

"Yeah," you say. Your voice is devoid of much emotion. You feel weirdly calm. "I know."

Your lack of attachment appears to confuse her further. She takes a breath before she speaks again, "You understand that you... that you tried to rape me."

"Yeah. I know."

"Would you have stopped if I hadn't kicked you?"

"I don't know."

Rose gapes at you. She doesn't even know how to respond to your dispassion. "Dave, this is... this is really bad. I — I can't... God. What do you expect me to do?"

You shrug. 

She looks torn. You think she's decided that you did it on purpose to drive her away, after everything else failed to convince her that you were beyond saving, but you know her stubborn will must be making it difficult to let you win. You share a long, terse moment of silence before she draws another shaking breath to speak. "You crossed a line," Rose tells you, and she sounds sadder than she ever has. She won't cry in front of you, you know.

You don't move from where you're sat on the floor. You're not sure you could. "Yeah. I know," you repeat.

"And... and I'm not like you. I can't be like you. I can't let someone try to hurt me like the way you did and — and pretend that it never happened."

"Yeah. I know."

"God, Dave," she breathes out, pressing her palms into her eyes. "Please say something that isn't that."

You don't know what to say. You look up at your sister and she looks at you and you know that she's realized then that she doesn't have a choice. Maybe she understands you a little better now, after all of those times Dirk did what he did to you and you _stayed_ because you loved him and nothing else could matter — but she knows that it has to matter, and even if she wants to she can't let it go. Rose is a stronger person than you've ever been.

"I'm sorry," she tells you. What a fucking joke.

You uneasily and unsteadily climb to your feet. It's a feat, but you manage Rose takes a guarded stance. "I'm just gonna go to sleep," you quietly say. "You can... do whatever you want to do. I won't come out."

This time, Rose is the one who doesn't know what to say. You spare her the trouble and just move past her to your room, shut the door, and collapse onto bed. Sleep, at last, comes easily.

 

49.

 

The return to tepid stagnation is almost comforting. 

The silence washes over you. You lay in bed awake and you don't know what time it is. You don't particularly care. You haven't gone outside since Rose left and you don't really intend to. When your food runs out, you'll just starve. You haven't eaten in at least the past 32 hours as it is and it's not so bad. Maybe you can let yourself go this way. You can't pull the trigger, but you can let the clock run down.

Your listlessness is interrupted by a knock on your door. You ignore it, at first; you can't think of any reason why anyone would be here to see you. But your visitor waits, and knocks again, and again, and again. Maybe it's Jade, you think. Rose has probably told her about what you did. You pull a pillow over your head to block out the sound.

_Knock knock knock._

Defeated, you pull yourself out of bed; the sensation of blood rushing from your head immediately makes you feel dizzy and sick. You stagger in the direction of your doorway, limbs weak, your vision blinded by grey static. You stop to collect yourself when you collide with wall. _Knock knock knock._

You make it to the front door and reach for the handle to pull it open. You hesitate for a moment, but you turn the knob, and you find probably the last person you would have expected to be standing on the other side.

"Good evening, Dave," you stepfather greets you, with an ever amiable tip of his hat.

You're just sort of shocked as you step aside to let him come into your apartment. He walks ahead of you at a leisurely pace, taking in the grandness of your apartment; you don't think he's ever been inside before.

You come to stand beside him as he stops by the kitchen island. "What the fuck do you want?" you ask him — you find your throat is painfully dry and it's a struggle to speak.

"Might you happen to have anything to drink?" he deflects.

You might be tempted to spit in his face, had you any moisture to offer. Instead, you give him a nasty glare and move to the cupboards to retrieve two glasses. You fill them with water from the tap. You don't care if he'd prefer something else.

You walk back around and rudely shove a glass in Egbert's direction, and make quick work on downing your own. You place yours onto the kitchen island and turn back to face him expectantly. He's taken just a sip of his own water, contented, and then moves to the living area to sit down. You reluctantly follow, stood across from him on the arrangement of couches. There's an awkward moment of silence before you finally sit, a comfortably wide berth between you. You repeat yourself in impatience, " _What?_ "

"Dave, I'm concerned," he cautiously begins. Your face twists in disdain. "As you've probably surmised, I heard about wha—"

" _Stop,_ " you tell him, hands curled into fists in your lap. "I know. I don't want a lecture. Don't say it. I know."

Your stepfather gives you a measured look, and takes a drink from his glass of water. He awkwardly sets it back down on his knee, held in place. There's nowhere for him to put it with the coffee table smashed. "All right," he allows you. "Dave, I want to help you."

You laugh in his face. "No you fucking don't. Cut the fucking shit, Egbert. Mom is dead."

There's a moment where your stepfather looks at you very critically, and his eyes harden, and his mouth forms into an inscrutable line. The affectation of compassion he wears gently falls from his face until he's looking at you honestly and bare, and something stirs at the pit of your stomach that's suspiciously similar to fear. When he speaks again, it's with a clarity freed of decades of burden. "No, I suppose I don't have a reason to pretend to be civil anymore," he says. "I hope you die."

It hurts. You weren't expecting it to, especially not from him, and you don't know why you're surprised. Maybe it's just a complacency that you've built, after nearly three decades of using him as an easy target for all of your frustration. No matter what you said or did to him, he would never raise a hand to you, and rarely ever his voice — he took everything you threw at him without much more than the momentary indiscretion of a defensive word. You're sure part of you knew that his patience with you was an artifice constructed for the benefit of your mother, but to hear the reality of his humanity vocalized and understand that your treatment of him has had its obvious consequence is more startling than it ought to be.

You look at him with bleary eyes and say nothing. The fury and the fight have gone out of you. What could you possibly have to say in reply to that? He has every reason to.

"I hope you die," he repeats. "You are... a terrible, spiteful man. Not even through conscious ill intent, which makes you all the more dangerous. You have caused each and every one of my children such immense suffering. You destroy everything that you touch. It would be so much simpler, so much easier, if you would just... die."

Your gaze drifts down to your hands and you enjoy the moment of silence between you until he speaks again, "... but I didn't come here to tell you to kill yourself."

You look back up to him again. "Then why?" you ask. When the words are out you realize your throat is oddly tight and your eyes sting. The overwhelming pang of shame keeps you from tears.

"Because I know that's not what Roxy would want," he tells you. His voice is soft, gentle. You feel so unbelievably patronized. 

In an instant your misery is replaced by rage. Your eyes snap back up to meet his and you're sure they're filled with fire — your jaw clenches tight and your fingernails dig into your palms and it's all you can do to hold yourself back from striking him. "Fuck you," you spit.

He's taken aback, but at once, not surprised. He regards you with a measured stare, and continues when you make no move to do anything but seethe where you are. "There's no one in the world she loved more than you, Dave. Do you think she would sit idly by and watch you slowly destroy yourself like this? She wouldn't, so neither can I. Wherever she is, I know she still —"

" _Wherever she is?_ She's dead, Egbert. She's not in heaven. She's in the ground. She's rotted away into nothing and dirt is all that's left. She doesn't know or care that you're doing this, so spare me your guilt."

You _are_ just being spiteful. He knows this. You know this. Part of you aches for so knowingly fulfilling his perception of you but what else is there for you to do?

He ignores you. "I've asked around and there are a couple of discrete rehabilitation programs you could —"

"I'm not going to rehab," you laugh. "As if _alcohol_ is the fucking root of my problem."

"You're —"

You move to stand. "Stop. I'm done with this."

"Dave —"

"Get out of my apartment or I'm going to call the fucking cops."

Egbert pauses, mouth open, but he considers it well and closes it. He allows himself a moment to stew in your hostility before he slowly rises. "Well," he says, with an air of finality. "I can't say that I didn't try."

You finally eat that night. It became impossible to ignore your body's demands any longer, after being shocked back into reality. You hate it. You miss the haze and the disassociation and you'd give anything to go back to the peaceful comfort of oblivion.

The liquor cabinet is starting to run low. There's only a few bottles left, and you grab one without looking. It's not quite full, but it'll have to do, so you throw back your head and drink it down and ignore the burn.

You lose track of time quickly enough. The ceiling spins above you from where you lay on the ground as you come to again. You don't recall how you got there, but it's as good as place to be as any.

You find yourself searching for anyone to blame but yourself. You've pushed everyone that you love away. You're broken, you're empty, you're useless, you have no future and a shit past and nothing to your name but billions of dollars that have never once done anything to truly make you happy. You have no excuse but you search for one so desperately because the delusion that you're a victim of anything but your own failures is the only thing that keeps you hanging on.

It's hard for you to even move. Your body is so tired, your limbs ache and your mouth and throat are dry and there's an agony in your chest you know nothing will ever fix. It's all you can do to dig your blunt fingernails into the grooves of the hardwood floor and painfully pull yourself to the bottle of vodka lain out on its side. You scrabble like a man in the desert, like whatever drops are left in that fucking bottle are an oasis to deliver you from the brink of death, but you know that's a joke more cruel than any mirage.

Your fingers shakily close around the neck of the bottle and you pull it closer towards you, inch by tortuous inch. You manage to roll onto your back and lift it to your lips, what little's left spilling out into your mouth and down the sides of your cheeks. It's a piteous portion and an even more inadequate comfort.

You let the bottle fall back to the ground with a loud clatter, and your vision is hazy as you watch it slowly roll back away.

When the darkness envelopes you, the only thing you can wish for is that it's for fucking good.

 

50.

 

You stand out on the edge of the terrace of your penthouse overlooking the city below. There's a gentle breeze tonight. It feels good on your skin.

Your hands grip the railing firmly as your gaze drifts down the skyline, over the bright city lights, to the mess of roads and cars at the foot of your tower. It's not that high up, you think. The earth doesn't feel that far away. 

You've started to disconnect. You sold all of your cars but one. You found a buyer for your apartment complex and all of the other properties you own. You cashed out your stocks and sent a big check to the IRS. You left a will, as simple as it is — your daughter will get everything — and all that's left is for you to go.

It's a leap of faith, and you take it.

 

*

 

Your car pushes 90 as you race down the highway. The roads are clear this time of night. You roll your windows down and enjoy the rush of air through your hair and in your face. It exhilarates you. You're free.

It's a day in the car and you don't stop, but you're not tired. You're gone. You've left everything behind and none of it matters — not the money, not the fame, not the judgment nor the shame. You can fly.

You make it to that little town outside of Houston just a bit before 9, and you remember where to go. The home is at the top of a hill, isolated and picturesque, perfectly designed to be forgotten. There are no cars in the visitor's parking lot out front. You imagine there hardly ever are.

The nursing home feels as still and dead as the air outside. There's a woman posted at the reception desk, and it takes a moment for her to realize that you're there. "May I help you?"

"I'm here to see Mr. Strider," you tell her. You don't even remember the man's first name. You don't think you ever asked.

The woman's face immediately darkens, and you assume the meaning quickly enough. Still, she takes a moment to check before she says it. "Mr. Strider..." The woman looks to her computer, and momentarily moves through the system. "Sir, Mr. Strider passed away last year."

"Oh."

She looks to you awkwardly. "I'm sorry for your loss. I don't think I've seen you in before. Were you a friend of Mr. Strider's?"

You're not sure how to answer the question. This man was never anything to you. You settle for a truth that feels like a lie, "He was my uncle."

"I'm sorry that you weren't told. Is there anything I can do to help? We are in contact with grief coun—"

"Did he have a contact on file?" you ask pointedly.

The woman seems a bit affronted to be cut off, but she checks anyway. "Well — that's confidential information. I can't gi—"

You pull out your wallet. The woman looks at you suspiciously. You open your wallet, and begin to thumb through your Benjamins. You get the address and leave.

The house on file is a good 50 miles further north of this already podunk town, but you get into your car and drive anyway. Your GPS struggles to map the roads, which grow more and more poorly paved as you turn off the major highway into wasteland until you're eventually treading on nothing but dirt. You aren't worried. You keep on going and it takes you there.

You can see it in the distance from so far away across the flat desert, but it barely feels like it's come any closer as you roll towards it in your car. You fear it might be a mirage as the image of it twists and bends at the edge of your vision, but slowly and surely enough, it resolves. It's just a little building at the end of a long dirt road.

There's a truck parked out in front. You stop your own car a little off the path, and you step out onto the cracked earth. It feels solid underneath your feet.

Loose dust disperses up into the air around as you trek up the length to the front door of the house. There's a bit of incline up the path that you hadn't noticed, and it feels further than it seemed. Before long, though, you find yourself stood there, at the end of thousands of miles and so many held breaths, and all that's left is one last wish.

You take a deep breath and you knock.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> wow wasnt that heartwarming and completely what everyone wanted out of this story
> 
> It's over!! Thank god!!! Bye!!!


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